


The Way Back

by Britpacker



Series: The Way Back [1]
Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-17
Updated: 2011-12-04
Packaged: 2018-08-15 17:04:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 22,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8064832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Britpacker/pseuds/Britpacker
Summary: After the run-in with Terra Prime, Enterprise is docked for a refit, her crew given generous leave.  If two of his senior officers choose to spend it aboard, who is Jonathan Archer to object – especially as he’s a romantic at heart!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).
> 
>  **Author's notes:** As ever, nothing but the errors belong to me!  
>  Spoilers: Erm, consider Seasons 3 & 4 generally spoiled! If there’s an ep not referenced, it’s not for the want of trying and there’s a mention of 1.16 “Shuttlepod One” in the first chapter, too.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malcolm Reed isn't a great fan of home leave. As Captain Archer knows, on this occasion he isn't alone...

"Really, Sir, I'd much sooner stay aboard." If his spine stiffened any further it was liable to snap, but as he tried to evade Captain Archer's concerned jade gaze Malcolm Reed didn't care. Why could the man not take a hint even when it bludgeoned him about the head? "The armoury team will be on board in two days' time, and I'd like to ensure there's no fault for them to find."

"Malcolm, you tooth-comb every defensive system once a month." Archer knew that for a fact, because the reports popped up in his inbox with metronomic regularity. "And Command's insisting we all take two months' vacation. Hell, even Leonard admits we've more than earned it! Even Phlox is heading back to Denobula - there's a Vulcan ship docking to pick him up in the morning. Surely you'd like to go visit your family!"

The withdrawal was minute but nobody made captain by being obtuse, and Jonathan Archer was Starfleet's finest. "I wouldn't wish to impose on anyone, Sir. With your permission, I'll remain aboard."

With or without permission Archer guessed: the Englishman was just too damned polite to omit the false courtesy toward a superior officer. "You can change you mind at any time, Malcolm," he said, only just holding back the hand that itched to reach out and squeeze the younger officer's rigid arm. "I know you'd rather not trust them with your phase cannons, but the Jupiter Station crew are pretty good if you give them the chance."

"When the upgrades are completed, perhaps I'll call on Madeleine," Reed allowed. _Anything_ , he thought desperately. _I'll concede anything if you'll just stop worrying at me like a mastiff with last week's Sunday joint!_

Even a year ago, Jonathan Archer admitted, he wouldn't have identified the pain that lanced through this particular subordinate's eyes. He'd gotten suckered into seeing Lieutenant Reed, tough-as-teak Armoury Officer, as the man wanted to be seen, overlooking the vulnerability just beneath the surface. "I'm sure your sister would be glad to see you, Malcolm," he said gently, pretending he didn't see the sceptical twist of the Englishman's thin, well-cut lips. "And even if she's busy there's a whole planet down there: unless you're tired of exploration."

"No, Sir." The man never gave up, a trait Reed had cursed and admired in equal measure over almost four years. "It's just..."

"The last couple of years have been tough for everybody. It's no crime to admit you need a while to take stock." This time Archer couldn't stop himself reaching out, wincing in sympathy at the tight knots in the muscles he felt beneath the crisply-pressed uniform sleeve. "Some people find it helps to go someplace different, but if you'd rather stay on a deserted starship..."

"I would. Sir." 

The courtesy was excruciatingly forced, but Archer ignored it. Sometimes Malcolm wished the man would simply blow up or give up instead of giving him that wide, genial smile, softening his stance and just waiting for him to crack.

"The whole business with Paxton was - difficult," he heard himself say, as if he of all people suddenly found silence unbearable. He tried biting into his bottom lip but to his horror it didn't work, the words almost tumbling over themselves in the rush to escape before his personalised hull plating re-polarised. "I could do with some quiet time pottering around the armoury while I, um, come to terms with a few things."

_Like my hopeless obsession with a man who will never know: my best friend who'll never see me as anything more. And you know about that too, Captain Bluff Ol'-Buddy-Boy, don't you?_

He was oblivious to the anguish that darkened his expressive eyes, bringing with it the deepest winter storm. Jonathan Archer sighed and - _finally!_ \- backed off.

"I'll know the ship's in good hands, Lieutenant," he said, too kindly. "But if you change your mind and want some breathing space, I've got a place overlooking the bay. I'll only be there a couple of weeks, but if you want someplace different to think, just comm. I'll leave the refrigerator stocked."

Speechless, Reed nodded as his commanding officer turned to go, waiting for the satisfying snap of the armoury door before allowing his watery knees to buckle. He slumped against the main console, all his finely-honed willpower not enough to stop the shudders that rippled through him, part astonished gratitude, part complete humiliation. Yes, Archer knew what he had to come to terms with. Wasn't he probably the first to hear their plans?

He slipped sideways into his seat, cradling his aching head in both hands. His best friend - at least, that's what he'd always thought - hadn't even told him what he was doing. He'd had to overhear it from a couple of scandal-mongering crewmen in the breakfast queue that morning. 

Resting his cheek against the reassuring coldness of his console Malcolm closed his eyes and tried for the hundredth time that day to block their tormenting words from his head. 

_"Wow, I didn't expect that! You're sure they're going to Vulcan again? I got the feeling last time it didn't go so well, what with her coming back married to another guy."_

_"Why not? She's divorced now, and with the baby and everything it's natural they'd want to spend time together."_

_"Ethan, it's not like they got it on to create her!"_

_"Yeah, but don't you think they'd like to? Hell, you just have to see the way they spit at each other to know it's pure sexual tension. Having been through everything with Elizabeth and all, who'd they turn to if not each other? Sure they're going to give that whole thing between them another try!"_

_"Now wouldn't that be the cutest thing! Do you think they'll want a Vulcan wedding, or will Commander Tucker convince her to let Captain Archer perform the ceremony?"_

Peanut butter smothered pancakes had never lost their appeal so fast. He didn't remember how he'd got out of the mess hall without falling over anybody. He hadn't even vomited until the safety of his own cabin.

Nausea rose again at the sharp recollection of the mess he still had to clean up in the bathroom. And, he admitted as he waited for the rolling in his guts to fade, from the final realisation his ancient hopes lay in tatters. If there had ever been a chance for him, the Xindi had killed it as brutally as they had Elizabeth Tucker and seven million others between Florida and Venezuela. Somehow their friendship had been salvaged since, and he had schooled himself to be content with that.

Or so he had thought. Before Paxton. 

Novakovic and Fisher were right he acknowledged, rubbing his burning face against the console in the vain hope of cooling the blood that stung hot beneath his fair skin. Baby Elizabeth's existence, however brief and unexpected, must draw Tucker back to his former lover, and what could be more natural than the bereaved parents taking comfort together? Hadn't he urged his friend to talk to the bloody Vulcan himself when Trip, swollen-eyed and clutching a whisky bottle, had turned up at his door in the middle of the night?

It had been the proper thing to do: unlike whimpering in the armoury like a lovelorn adolescent. Self-disgust rose to swirl through his vitals with misery in an unlovely cocktail that ricocheted between brain and belly. _Why would the most genial, charming, downright devastatingly sexy creature on the ship want a relationship with you? You're bloody pathetic, man!_

Yes, he was; and that couldn't continue. On a shaky inhalation, _Lieutenant Reed_ pulled himself up to a sitting position and tapped a succession of commands on instinct, relief coursing through him as the screen lit up with a perfectly calibrated set of results. Work. As long as he could bury himself in work, he could survive anything.

*

"You keep outta trouble Cap'n, you hear?" Commander Charles Tucker III clouted his friend on the shoulder, raising his voice so the passengers already squeezed into both crowded shuttlepods could hear. The two men grinned at the trickle of sheepish titters that emerged from the little vessels before Archer did his best to look offended.

"Take your own advice, Commander," he shot back, a turn of the shoulder drawing the younger man away from too many watchful stares. "You sure you'll be okay?"

"Course." Tired blue eyes bruised by sleeplessness didn't convey the confidence Tucker tried to exude, but Archer refused to call his friend on it in public. "I just need a little time to take stock, that's all."

"Your parents..."

"Yeah, guess Mom's not happy." 

He snorted. "Have you been taking classes in understatement from Malcolm? I'm seeing more than mild disappointment when I picture Leanne hearing her boy's not coming home!"

Trip shrugged, the listlessness that alarmed Archer and his Chief Medical Officer more than any irrational burst of Tucker fury plain in the slump of his broad shoulders. "Yeah, well, like Dad told her it's a Tucker trait. When it feels like our lives are just spinnin' away without our input on the wheel, we need to crawl into a hole and- and think."

_Crawl into a hole and die._

Malcolm Reed's voice, shivery with cold despite the fiery heat of the words, pierced his skull as it had in a freezing shuttle too many years ago. Unconsciously he straightened up.

No crazy, ill-considered suicide bids this time. Charles Tucker III, with a little help from a man named Paxton, had gotten himself into the mess. It was his duty to stick around and sort it out.

_Eventually._

When the urge to bury himself beneath his bedclothes and howl had passed. 

"Well, between twenty-hundred and oh-seven-thirty hours, Enterprise is all yours for the next six weeks." The near corner of Johnny's mouth twitched, but in his melancholic state Trip missed a sign that should have been as intrusive as the caterwauling tactical Alert sirens their Armoury Officer had once toyed with introducing. "There's only one other crewman staying aboard, and even the station catering team are evacuating Enterprise at the end of their shifts."

"Sounds good." Probably somebody with no folks to visit Trip decided, letting sourness cover any pang of guilt the thought stirred up. "See you soon, Cap'n - you'd better run, you're keepin' people waiting here."

"Remember, call me if you need a friend." Privately Jonathan hoped the younger man would find all the friendship he needed aboard a near-deserted starship, but if the offer wasn't made Trip, even in his current state of dejection, would notice it and wonder. "The captain's mess is yours while I'm gone: just don't leave your dishes on the floor."

"Aye, Sir." His smile was genuine as he saluted, warmth sluicing through Trip's belly at such pragmatic kindness. He could avoid a single subordinate easily enough. Now he had a bolt-hole from the stares of her temporary crew as well. Life wasn't all bad.

_Yeah. Just mostly._


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enterprise is a big ship when you're trying to hide. Not, however, quite big enough for two...

Nobody came near his domain during the first day. If he didn't know the man better, Reed would have suspected Captain Archer of warning the station personnel off. 

He heard their disembodied voices floating through the network of maintenance shafts; even the odd clang as a tool was dropped within Enterprise's metallic innards. And he thanked his merciless childhood training for at least providing him with the self-reliance to pack a thermos of tea and a handful of chocolate biscuits into his regulation toolbox before leaving his cabin ten minutes before Jupiter Station's roving galley crew came aboard. The last thing he needed in his current state was a dozen gawkers whispering behind their hands every time he walked into the mess hall.

By dinnertime his stomach was grumbling but he ignored it in the hope of it going away, safe in the knowledge no well-meaning Denobulan was going to shove his prominent beak around the armoury door. And when that failed, he clambered through the Jeffries tubes to B deck and stuffed two chocolate bars into his pockets, splashing water over his sweaty face before sneaking back to his post. 

There were times, he mused, when Trip's accusations of _wannabe hermit status_ were not altogether removed from the truth. Not that he'd ever tell the loud-mouthed redneck.

He smacked himself hard with one of the caramel bars he'd scavenged, hoping the mild sting would deflect from the tight clench around his heart that accompanied every thought of the dazzling engineer. Trip would be on Vulcan by now. God only knew how he'd cope with the arid consolations of logic for his bitterly emotional loss. 

_It's his choice, Reed. After all, he responded really well to your wittering sympathy when the first Elizabeth died, didn't he? You're damn lucky he's still your friend._

Lucky and grateful he reminded himself fiercely, tearing the soft bar with his teeth as a Vulcan Long-Tooth Lioness might a human head. He was not going to forget that, even if it slowly killed him from the inside out.

At twenty-four hundred hours, still trapped in his small territory, he decided it might do exactly that. No matter how hard he worked at blocking them, visions of Trip and T'Pol together permeated his conscious and played merry hell with the delicate realignment of the phase cannon power grid he was supposed to be completing. Gloomily giving way to the thick, bubbling tar sensation in the pit of his stomach he deactivated the unfinished section of the grid and wandered out into the enveloping darkness of the powered-down ship's corridors, making his way by instinct toward the mess hall. Something would have been left lying around and as long as it wasn't covered in furry green mould he supposed he really ought to eat it.

The voice of his maternal grandmother, lilting with laughter, danced through his head as he reached the galley doors. _Could eat a scabby cat, my dear._

Granddad Parker was apt to say it would have tasted better than much of his wife's cooking. 

Lost in cheerful musings for the first time all day he shuffled behind the counter, invading Chef's territory with a shamelessness even he would have shied from under other circumstances. For several minutes he rootled contentedly among the day's leftovers, oblivious to the figure hunched in the farthest corner of the large room and the narrowed eyes that tracked his every movement.

The moment the mess hall doors had parted to reveal an unmistakable trim figure Trip had frozen with his milk tipped halfway to his open mouth. _It can't be - yes it is, and oh God, why didn't Jon warn me, I'd know that sexy tush anywhere._

He should, Tucker acknowledged as he lowered his slippery glass before it could escape suddenly lifeless fingers. He'd spent enough time hovering behind it on the bridge, just memorising every line and curve. Reed bent down to grab a plate from the shelves beneath the counter and his mouth dried out from admiring the way the tight fabric of the regulation jumpsuit flexed and clung. _Typical Malcolm_ , he thought fondly. _We're on leave, it's midnight, and he's still in uniform._

He couldn't in good conscience hide in the shadows and ogle the man, and now he knew exactly who his workaholic shipmate was ignoring his presence indefinitely wasn't an option. Trip briefly considered bolting - Reed wouldn't be armed, after all - before his gut spasmed and he acknowledged he couldn't leave Mal to fret over who'd been spying on him.

At the same time it was never a good idea to startle the most dangerous man in the fleet so, setting aside his unfinished drink, Trip rose and strode confidently across the dining space, keeping himself clear of the deeper shadows. Leaning against the counter, he waited until his friend had straightened and set down his crockery before clearing his throat. "Evenin' Malcolm."

The Englishman swung round, both cake-filled hands clamping instinctively into fists as shock kicked him hard in both balls and brain, blotting out enough cognitive function that the achingly familiar voice briefly failed to register. "What the - Trip!"

"The one and only." Momentarily he had his man off-balance, and Tucker watched with fascination as something suspiciously like panic chased over the Armoury Officer's habitually composed features. He glanced at the trickle of Victoria sponge crumbs seeping between the lieutenant's clenched fingers and shrugged an apology. "Sorry. Guess I startled y' even while I was trying to be obvious, huh?"

"If you wanted to do _that_ you might have bloody well said hello when I came in." His inner subordinate cringed from the harshness of the rebuke but its shrill squeak of protest was lost under the drum roll of his palpitating heart. The blond brought up both hands, palms uppermost.

"Sorry. I just wasn't sure who it was at first," he lied, trying not to wilt under the gimlet grey stare that had caused bellowing Klingon warriors and rampaging Xindi to quaver. "Cap'n told me there was somebody else stayin' aboard, but..."

"You had the advantage, then." _Not for the first time_ , Malcolm thought grimly as he willed his shallow breathing to steady. "I was under the impression everyone else had abandoned ship, so to speak."

"Jon must've forgotten to mention it." Trip eyed the pile of cake crumbs gathering beneath the Englishman's balled hands. "Um, wanna grab another piece of that? I'll fix you some tea."

"Oh." Helplessly Malcolm gazed at the mess he'd made of Chef's pristine surfaces. "I'd better clean that up, hadn't I?"

"Guess so." As he moved off to order up tea - two sugars, very little milk, Lieutenant Reed's special recipe - Trip cast a puzzled glance back, watching the usually fastidious Brit listlessly sweep the crumbs into his palm and drop them into an under-counter bin before absently dusting off his palms. He could understand his looming out of the dark had given a preternaturally wary man a scare, but this distracted air was all wrong. "You want more cake?"

"Not really." He could almost feel the effort it took for Reed to lift his dark head and flash that familiar heartbreaking half-smile. "I'm not sure what I wandered down here for, actually. I'm not particularly hungry."

"I'm guessing you should be, since I didn't see you in here for a meal, and none of the station guys mentioned seein' you around." In truth he'd barely listened to a thing they'd said, but if the words _Lieutenant_ and _Reed_ had cropped up in close proximity, Tucker knew he would have noticed.

"They probably don't know, since I got in and out of the armoury via the maintenance shafts." That won him a laugh, which perked Malcolm up visibly as he slid into a chair facing his friend, both hands wrapped gratefully around the steaming mug provided. "While the weapons team are aboard, I think I may work in my quarters. They crawling all over your engines yet?"

"Like bugs." Now they were talking shop, Tucker thought, Malcolm seemed calmer, even allowing himself to relax a touch from his usual alert posture. "It's okay though: they're a little in awe of me. You might wanna hang out in your office - keep 'em on their toes."

"I'll bear that in mind, but frankly I'm not keen on being gawked at like some kind of museum piece."

He sipped his tea, contemplating its caramel-coloured depths for a moment. "You're getting awfully good at this, by the way. There's a future for you as a London tea-boy if Command ever threaten to pull the plug on us again."

It was difficult to tell by the minimal illumination that seeped through their large viewport, but he rather thought Trip might be blushing. "Nice t' know there's somebody I haven't disappointed in the last couple 'f years," the engineer grated, too hoarse to make the glibness he aimed for. 

_Bloody marvellous_. Not only was he trapped on a deserted starship with the object of his increasingly desperate affections, but he was suddenly the man's personal morale officer to boot. The universe and Captain Archer, Malcolm considered, owed him. _Big-time_ as the Yanks would say.

"Yes, I'm sure the whole of Starfleet's disgusted with the way you've kept this rickety old bag of bolts flying through the Delphic Expanse and past the best efforts of the Romulans," he drawled, sliding into a slouch and crossing his arms in the most disdainful manner he could muster with a corkscrew twisting his intestines. "And of course you're personally responsible for all the crap that's been thrown our way by the Xindi, the Romulans, Suliban and Terra Prime. Really, Commander, it's no wonder you choose to hide away instead of taking a holiday like any innocent person!"

"What? Why, you insensitive, condescending little..." His instantaneous anger reverberated around the deserted room before rebounding like a physical weight slammed into his hollow chest. Trip stared at the smaller man, captivated by the slow-motion lift of a fine dark brow, the all-too-knowing sadness in the shadowed eyes. "Aw, fuck! Malcolm, I'm sorry. I shouldn't keep takin' out all the shit in my life on you."

"I do tend to invite it." He hadn't allowed himself to notice, with the horrors unleashed by Paxton's troop of maniacs in full flow, exactly how haggard the handsome Southerner had become - or if he had, Malcolm amended, he'd schooled himself to ignore it. "But - what in blazes are you doing here, Trip? Why aren't you at home with the family, letting your mother spoil you rotten? Surely that'd do you more good than moping in a dark messhall in the middle of the night!"

"Hell no!" Droplets of room-temperature milk sprayed the table and daintily Malcolm wiped them away with his uniform sleeve. "I mean - how could I tell them about the baby? _Hey Mom, you were grandma to a Vulcan for a while, pity you never got t' see her, but her mom wouldn't've appreciated Dad's smartass comments about pointy ears_. They'd all cry and get mad and try to smother me with all their dumb ignorant sympathy, and I'd just... blow up. I can't face them with all that shit, Malcolm. Not until I got some way of facin' it myself."

The dark head dipped. "It's probably the most insensitive thing I could say, Trip, but - I think I _do_ understand. Having people tiptoe around whispering _do you think he's all right?_ and asking you in those strange, sad little voices if they can get you anything is enough to drive one insane, isn't it?"

"Yeah." He was momentarily tempted to ask when anyone had ever shown that kind of concern for his taciturn companion, convinced by Jon's remarks on the subject that Stuart and Mary Reed were unlikely to have even noticed if their son was upset. "'specially when you're not and there's nothin' anyone can do but give you space. I figured - hell, I don't know what I figured! I just didn't wanna go face the world, you know? Not just Mom an' Dad wringing their hands and tellin' me how sorry they are. _Everybody_ down there knows Enterprise."

"And you can't fart on a street corner without somebody whipping out a vid to record the momentous event," Reed concluded drily. Trip was startled to feel a bark of laughter break out of his chest. 

"Somethin' like that," he agreed, downing the remainder of his milk in a single swallow. "What about you, though? Your folks away?"

"I've no idea." The hands which had been wrapped loosely around his cup dropped into a tight clasp on his lap. Reed's posture tightened as if his commanding officer had materialised opposite. Trip found himself wondering if the man had any idea how fast he could freeze up a whole room. 

"Your sister?" he tried. The deceptively narrow shoulders lifted.

"Madeleine's just set up her own business; she's hardly got time to play nursemaid."

 _Ouch_. Any sane person would have backed off there and then, but where angels feared to tread, Tucker footprints proliferated. "No old girlfriend you'd like to revisit?"

His answer came through gritted teeth. "Apparently not."

"Well aren't we just a couple 'f old hermits?" Tucker growled, shoving his drained glass aside. "Guess it's just as well we can talk to each other, because we're sure as hell not talkin' to anybody else!"

Malcolm glanced away, desperate to hide the ridiculous pleasure he knew must be written on his face. "Misery loves company, Commander," he drawled.

"Malcolm, if I hear you calling me anythin' but Trip 'til we launch outta this dock I'll hafta whip your skinny British ass."

"I'd like to see you try." _Oh, wouldnâ€™t I?_ "Charles."

For a moment they stared at each other. Then, simultaneously, they laughed. "Okay, maybe it's not a good idea while Phlox is on vacation," Tucker conceded, mopping his streaming eyes. "Breakfast in the Cap'n's mess tomorrow?"

"Or later today as the case may be."

Irony. Like formality, a trusted barrier against the tides of emotion this brilliant, beautiful and heartbroken man could send washing through him with a look, and it didn't let Reed down now. Chuckling tiredly, Trip hauled himself upright and tossed his empty glass into the proper receptacle, giving his friend's dishevelled hair a further ruffling as he passed. "Oh-eight-hundred hours, Mal, and if you're late I'll come drag you outta your cabin by the ear. Understood?"

"As I'm banned from using your title, you can't try pulling rank."

A big, work-toughened hand snatched his and pumped. "Deal. But you'll show up all the same, yeah?"

 _As if I could say not to that puppy-eyed look!_ "I suppose so," Malcolm conceded wearily, something lurching in his chest as he was heaved upright and guided, his hand still captive, toward the doors. Trip's delighted whoop echoed through the deserted vessel, and to his companion it seemed the sound filled every internal corridor with starlight. He hadn't heard that sound, a fixture of their first few years, in much too long.

It thrilled him beyond reason that he could provoke it. The side-effect - a night filled with maddeningly erotic dreams in which the sound was stirred by passion - he could live with for the simple, shattering joy of seeing that wide-open, truly happy Southern smile.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Routine. It's addictive, but it can also be dangerous.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> References: 1.18 “Rogue Planet” and 1.25 “Two Days And Two Nights” This fic is getting longer, and angstier, than I expected, but I don’t _do_ misery-fics. Despite the best efforts of Messers Tucker  & Reed to derail me, I _will_ get to the happy ending!!

Though he cursed himself for the quadrant's biggest fool Malcolm found himself sliding over the next few days into a dangerously addictive routine. Breakfast with Trip as soon as the galley opened at 0730; an hour to denigrate the work ethic, intellectual capacity and probable ancestry of their temporary staff before clambering into maintenance shafts in different parts of the ship to handle the really delicate upgrades themselves. Lunch at 1230 with Trip; time to giggle over old pranks and reminisce about basements on Risa and camping trips on Dakala until they both ached from laughing and neither the indiscreet glances of their workmates or their looming personal demons could cut through Malcolm's happy trance.

Then dinner with Trip, late enough to catch the end of galley service when fewer strangers were about to evade their eyes then turn and stare as they carried their meals to the sanctuary of Archer's private dining room. Somehow the necessary act of consuming nourishment late in the evening softened into an act of quiet worship: as if just being in his beloved's company, hearing his voice and watching the downtime-level low light play across the tranquil set of his even features soothed Malcolm's troubled soul and allowed sleep - so often difficult for him to find - to come easily after.

He was, Reed considered disgustedly as he changed out of a crumpled uniform and into fresh jeans and a short-sleeved red shirt on the eighth night, an abject specimen. Pathetically grateful for whatever scraps of attention Trip tossed his way and hoarding them like an old-time mariner might his tot. He made himself sick.

But every evening when the cheery hail came over the comm. he forgot to care. Good God, he was even changing into _civvies_ because the man had the temerity to object to uniforms during official leave!

The buzz of his doorchime caused a funny little flip of the heart and his fingers trembled around his comb. "It's open!"

"You're gettin' careless, Mister Reed." The shiny surface of the bulkhead gave him fair warning; the bugger was wearing blue, his hair spiked softly in a defiantly off-duty style. _Edible. I wish he didn't do this to me!_

"I'd fancy my chances against any of the locals, Mister Tucker," he replied sweetly, spinning just fast enough to catch the disappearance of a tongue-tip. _He must be hungry. Best not faff about, Reed._ "Most of the station personnel haven't got further than the end of the docking arm in years! Any idea what's on the menu?"

"Same things as last night: meatloaf, burgers with fries, pizza and a rice dish." Tucker dragged himself upright from his slouch against the wall and did his damndest not to stare at the way velvet-soft faded denim clung to his friend's powerful thighs. "I'm starting to look forward t' Chef coming home. He gets some weird ideas, but he's never dull!"

"I'll remind you of that next time I hear you squawking about the _freaky foreign stuff he's put in the soup_ ," Reed told him, surprised to find himself physically removing the blond from his cabin; the first mention of food was usually enough to have Trip Tucker sprinting toward the mess. "You get the warp coils finished?"

"Almost." The snub nose wrinkled schoolboyishly. "Hell, if I had my own crew it'd have been done three days ago. These station guys... no sense of urgency."

"They will have, with one of my torpedoes up their arses." The threat was overheard by a pair of malingering technicians languidly prodding through one of the maintenance hatches in the hall. Malcolm was mildly diverted to see the smaller blench.

The bigger one jabbed his companion in the midriff, going cross-eyed with the effort of watching them pass without turning his copper head. "Most dangerous man in Starfleet," Tucker mused in a stage-whisper. "Think they've heard that about you, Mal?"

"Oh, I hope so." _Mal_. Anyone else who called him that would be flat on his back in a nanosecond. Spoken in a lazy drawl that seemed to hold the single syllable forever, it made him swoon inside like a teenage girl. 

Outside the galley doors he paused, sucked in a breath and straightened his shoulders. "Ready to face the gawpers?"

"We're close as most 'f these folks have come to seeing aliens since they joined the fleet: we can take it." His arm was punched, comradely: another unthinking gesture of affection he would never endure from anyone else. "O- _kaay_ , looks like the meatloaf again for me. Those burgers are curlin' over."

"We've been serving since eighteen hundred hours, Commander." Rubbing her hands on a stained apron, the surliest of the serving staff slopped a portion onto the nearest plate. "Lieutenant, what'll you have?"

"The same, I suppose." He'd finished off the digestives in his cabin last night. Damn.

_Or rather, Hollow-Legs Tucker munched his way through a whole bloody packet while watching the sodding baseball on my screen last night._

The dread alternatives of picking through the meatloaf or going hungry receded from his mind. The bugger had left his bunk covered in crumbs, too, and Malcolm hadn't minded a bit.

"C'mon Malcolm, we're gettin' those looks again." The silence that descended on a room whenever he walked into it unnerved Trip and he could feel himself shrivelling inside his baggy sweater. Not for the first time he found himself admiring Malcolm's imperturbable dignity. 

_And his gorgeous ass. His perfect milky skin. Oh, not forgetting those drownable mid-Atlantic eyes._

He was so caught up admiring them he didn't see them narrow and the fine-cut lips below thin into a tight line. "People are _going_ to stare when you're standing around like a spare willy at a wedding, Commander. Shall we..."

_Shit_. Carelessness around dangerously flammable substances - like Malcolm Reed's temper - was something he'd been warned against in his first warp theory class. "Sorry. After you, Lieutenant."

He hadn't intended to emphasise the other man's rank and automatically he stretched to pat the ramrod back in apology. It was just unfortunate that Malcolm had taken his first step toward their haven and his hand connected, lover-like, with the Englishman's right buttock.

Trip hadn't felt so many eyes boring into him since he'd sneezed on Arunga Prime; and the natives there had two pairs each. "Sorry," he hissed.

Malcolm didn't trust himself to reply. Together they almost bolted into the captain's mess. "Guess they're gonna stare even harder now."

He didn't sound offended, Reed realised absently. "Probably," he answered, forking up a mouthful of meatloaf without hesitating in his confusion. "P'raps we should eat in the main mess tomorrow. They must think we're a pair of right antisocial tossers."

"And you're saying we're not?"

"Me? Absolutely. You? I've met less gregarious Iyaks, and you know how long it took to get out of their _small informal leave-taking ceremony_!"

Tucker grimaced; from the harsh truth of his friend's words as much as the memory of four hours standing at Johnny's shoulder nodding like a mechanical woodpecker every time their hosts paused for breath. "Guess I'm not up to makin' friends and influencin' people right now."

"Sorry." Of course he didn't want to be stared at by a bunch of complete strangers who - despite Starfleet's best efforts - had probably heard a dozen different variations on the brief captive life of his unexpected daughter. "I - you don't have to babysit me if you'd sooner be left alone. I don't want to intrude..."

"Figure you know if I didn't want your company, I'd tell y'." Though he softened the words with a small grin, Trip felt his own flinch reverberate through the younger man. His cruelty in the Expanse, though implicitly forgiven, couldn't be forgotten that easily.

He was awed by the compliment Malcolm had paid him by even remaining his friend. _More than you deserve, Trip ol' buddy. Gotta be grateful for small mercies, like Granny always said._

No resentment showed in the Englishman's expressive eyes as he prodded his unappealing dinner. "Does that mean you're coming over to play that new war game of mine tonight?" he asked mildly.

"Hell, yeah." Even on screen blowing things up was less his style than building them, but for a couple of hours more in the company of a relaxed and animated Malcolm Reed, Tucker would present his butt for whipping on whatever fancy computer game the man desired. 

The pulse in his cock throbbed hard. _Oh, man. You've never been into that kind of kink, but around Malcolm... think EPS grids and sensory relays. Mind out of the gutter, or tonight is gonna be torture!_

Sighing inwardly the Southerner tried to contribute intelligibly to the dissertation on vid game graphics his companion kept up, marvelling at the change which had come over the reclusive Brit in the past four years. He'd found the man attractive - infuriating but attractive, he conceded - from the outset, but as he had gradually unbent, showing off the playful, witty, challengingly brilliant man beneath the stoic officer's mask the mere physical had faded into the background. If it could only stay there, Trip Tucker's life now would be a lot less complicated.

And, he admitted as they stacked the remnants of their meals and headed for the door, one helluva lot less fun.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malcolm loses his temper. This leads to some unexpected admissions...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Consider anything remotely Trip/T’Pol from the final two seasons effectively spoiled. Oh, and 4.17 “Bound” comes into that category with a vengeance.

When Tucker got tangled up in a difficult upgrade, he commed Malcolm rather than asking one of the local technicians prowling his realm for help. When the Armoury Officer needed a hand performing surgery on the forward port cannon in its cramped bay he summoned the Chief Engineer on a whim he almost regretted after being forcibly removed for a late lunch and protesting loudly all the way to E deck. People started moving aside when they passed in corridors. A path magically opened itself between the galley counter and Captain Archer's private dining room no matter how crowded the mess hall might be when they walked in. Reed registered it all with vague amusement. 

Had he been free for more than a minute of his delirious Tucker-induced daze paranoia might have kicked in, but it seemed with Trip at his side all his inbuilt defences depolarised. Malcolm had seldom been happier and without noticing it he drifted past the point of being embarrassed by his hopelessness.

Even though they spat at each other like a pair of territorial tomcats when the armoury's adaptations sneaked too deeply into the depleted power systems of a starship in partial shutdown they gravitated together. Tired and aching after a fourteen-hour day in the maintenance shafts they practically held each other up on the painful drag to the galley, still stubbornly defending their viewpoints, the abandoned distinctions of rank restored for the purpose of a good argument. 

"As I keep explaining, Commander, the failsafes have been tested under full operating conditions. I'm not going to blow us - along with half the station - to the Outer Darkness." Reed sounded shrill to his own ears; perilously close to bursting into tears or stamping his foot at the sheer unmitigated obstinacy of the man. "Honestly Trip, where d' you think I got my engineering degrees? Out of an antique bloody Beano?"

"Comic books, Lieutenant?" They'd started work before the station people boarded and hadn't stopped for tea or piss-breaks since. Tucker's bladder burned and his stomach growled, but nothing irritated him more than the half-banked fury he read in the younger man's eyes. "Dammit Malcolm! I _know_ you're a damn fine engineer, but not in advanced warp mechanics, alright? I know my job, and I know what the engines can take."

"And if you had a degree in applied munitions science, you might understand the capacity of the cannons to compensate for your engines' failings!" Barely grunting at the server the Brit seized a plate of pizza and spun on his heel toward the captain's mess. He could feel the Southerner's exasperation vibrating across the room in his wake. _Good. Bloody stuck-up warp engineers, thinking their science is the only one that matters!_

"Jesus, Malcolm!" Barely waiting until they had privacy before he erupted, Tucker slammed his dinner down on the table and glared a hole through the bristling brunet's forehead. "What is it about you that just can't take _no_ for an answer?"

"And what is it about _you_ , Commander that prevents you even _listening_ to a subordinate's suggestion before dismissing it out of hand?" The retort rang false in his own ears but with his emotions sloshing like unmixed pigswill in his guts Reed no longer cared. Hands on hips he glared back, all the unwanted passion he felt for the man fuelling an irrational, overwhelming rage. "I don't know why you didn't just fuck off to Vulcan with _her_ after all - you might have picked up some of their capacity to think rationally along with their poncy meditation techniques!"

The one part of his brain that still contained Lieutenant Reed, the discreet and professional Starfleet officer, was screaming at him to stop, but just for once Malcolm was unshackled, free to pour out his self-loathing desperation against its unwitting cause. Tucker could only gape as if he had never seen him before.

"Why in hell would I go to _Vulcan_?" he bellowed, and in the next room a dozen conversations stopped dead. Reed's snort rebounded around their metallic box.

"To _recuperate_ , according to the rumours I heard," he drawled, an ocean of innuendo seeping through the word that he instantly regretted. "I mean - everyone feels it's quite natural you'd want to spend time with T'Pol after everything that happened."

"Is it, now?" Bile stung the back of his throat as Trip threw himself into his usual seat, scowling morosely into his meal. "That what people were sayin' about us? That because of Elizabeth we'd be rippin' each other's pants off t' make another little hybrid?"

"I think it was more a case of consoling each other in a Vulcan monastery than romping in the desert." Seeing the man so utterly defeated drained all the anger from him: after all, Malcolm conceded, it was hardly Trip's fault he was both depressingly irresistible and blatantly straight, and to see one of the very few individuals he could admit to loving unreservedly in such distress was torture beyond anything the Suliban could invent. "And it'd be perfectly understandable, what with the bond you have..."

"Yeah, guess we do." A bitter laugh wormed free of Trip's throat before comprehension hit him like an avalanche. His head jerked back, panic clawing through his leaden guts. "And just how do you know about _that_?"

"I saw her, remember?" 

"Her?"

Malcolm had been in some surreal conversations in his time, but this one took the cake. "Elizabeth of course. I peeped in on you in Sickbay, and oh God Trip, I'm so sorry, I thought you'd seen me..."

Elizabeth. Oh yes, that was a bond. "I thought... hell forget it. It's not important."

"Really?" That was his Malcolm, tenacious. Damn nosey, whether he admitted it or not. And delectable as he gnawed his bottom lip and fidgeted, clearly caught between fight and flight. 

For once, flight won. "I'm sorry," he muttered, shoving aside his untouched meal as he stumbled toward the door, head down to hide the heat that burned his cheeks. "I - you'd obviously rather be alone. I didn't mean..."

"Relax Mal." His hand felt heavy as he raised it, stopping the brunet with a touch. "I'm the one should be sorry, snappin' and snarlin' at you like that. Sit down and eat, okay? Guess folks are right: there is a bond between T'Pol and me, but it's... complicated."

"Name me anything in our lives that isn't." His instinct rebelled but his body meekly did as it was bidden. Obviously Trip was in just that state of morose exhaustion whereby unburdening himself seemed like a good idea, however much it might be regretted in the morning. He must have been a mass-murdering cannibal in a previous existence, Malcolm decided, to deserve so much agony in this.

"You know I slept with her," the Southerner stumbled, the words a serrated blade plunged into his hearer's heart. Malcolm summoned a watery smile.

"Following your little _chat_ in the middle of the mess I doubt there's a humanoid life form in the quadrant that doesn't."

For some reason the forced humour brought a brilliant blush to Tucker's too-pale, waxy skin. "Yeah, I'd been trying to forget about that. Anyhow, when we - while we were um, doin' it, she formed this psychic link between us. It's a Vulcan thing," he finished lamely. "Comes in real handy for bondmates, apparently."

The jagged blade lodged in his chest twisted 360 degrees. "If that's supposed to explain why you didn't go to Vulcan..."

"I was an experiment, remember?" The tall engineer seemed to shrink in on himself with remembered humiliation. "T'Pol didn't know she was doin' it; didn't even think it could happen between a Vulcan and a primitive. She's young by their standards; hell, she might've been a virgin, and don't that make things worse? She keeps on apologising... tellin' me she didn't intend for it to happen, that itâ's wrong for the both of us... maybe even dangerous. And now she's gone home to find a way of breakin' it, and she won't come back 'til we're both _free_."

His mouth felt like sandpaper; his guts lurched as if he were seasick. Yet Malcolm couldn't prevent the awful question popping out, as mild as if it meant nothing at all. "You don't sound awfully happy about that."

Trip assaulted his pizza, sawing through the hardened crust with a violence that threatened his plate, and possibly the table, as well. 

"I'm not _happy_ she didn't even bother telling me until months later: left me thinkin' I was goin' insane, like I couldn't control my own mind," he grated as a section of crust whizzed past the Englishman's shoulder "Dammit, Malcolm! She was in my head, her thoughts playin' hell with mine, and she didn't even _tell_ me 'til the Orions came aboard and every other man on the ship got the screamin' hots for them!"

"Did I ever thank you for shooting me, by the way?" Sometimes he felt as if somebody else was directing his brain - or at least his vocal chords as Malcolm heard his own faintly ironic tone bounce back off the wall at him. "Awfully embarrassing to be controlled by one's libido when one's supposed to be the _paranoid nutter_ in charge of security."

"You're not paranoid," Trip objected automatically. "And you think that's embarrassing? Try bein' psychically linked to a Vulcan! She said I didn't need to know - said I'd've gotten emotional and been irrational about it, and you know what?"

"She was right?"

"Damn straight. Hell, you can't blame a guy for feelin' used."

"No." All the resentment he had banked down over T'Pol's callous misuse of a man Reed knew to be much more sensitive than most people guessed flared up again like molten lava bubbling in his belly. "Can - is she confident it can be broken? I suppose she wants it to be?"

"Course she does." For the first time Tucker's head came up, lifeless blue eyes meeting a concerned grey stare direct. "Least - she's gotta want it broken, right? It's not like she's in love with me or anything."

It took a moment for the short yelp of sound he emitted to register as a laugh. "Y' know Mal, I really thought I might be in love with her for a while, and all along it was her damn telepathic interference. Her mom asked me why I hadn't told her how I felt right before she married Koss, and I couldn't answer. Guess deep down I knew it's because I didn't."

Malcolm was sure his sigh of relief must have been felt on the bridge, but Trip didn't react beyond stabbing his unfortunate dinner one more time. "Jesus, I thought I was goin' crazy! I couldn't get her out of my head; kept thinkin' about her at the dumbest times, and then... then we found out about Elizabeth and I could feel T'Pol's pain all tangled up with mine, and suddenly I was hangin' onto her again. It almost made sense..."

"And then she announced she was off to sever the bond." Had their First Officer been within reach, Malcolm thought grimly, he'd have given a practical demonstration as to why he was regarded as the most dangerous man in Starfleet. _Nostrils are the only sensitive thing about the callous bint!_

"Yeah." His innards clenched and apprehension showed itself plain across his open, even features as Tucker gazed at his friend. "I want to be glad, Malcolm. I don't want no telepathic connection with somebody I don't love, but... maybe it's because of the baby, or maybe it's just the fear of being isolated - losin' something _special_ , somehow. I care for T'Pol and all: I don't want to see her hurt, and you were right when you told me that night she needed me. Jesus, listen to me! I'm pathetic, and you wonder why I didn't go home to see my folks!"

Lying back in his seat, he blinked against the sudden moisture that filled his eyes. "I'm scared, Malcolm," he said wonderingly. He sucked in a massive breath, his shoulders beginning to heave as the emotions he had suppressed for too long began to surge. "God help me, I'm so damn _scared_!"

"With all you've been through in the last two years, small wonder." The self-confident, gregarious engineer whose emotional assurance had radiated so much strength to him looked shrunken and alone, frightened as a lost child, and it was more than Malcolm's heart could stand. For the first time in his life, without pausing to consider the implications of the act, he got up, walked around the table and stooped to give another human being a hug.

It was only when a pair of strong arms wrapped around his waist and the other man buried his face against Malcolm's chest he understood what he was doing, and then it was too late to back out. Cautious, he brought a hand to rest against the soft blond hair, carding his fingers carefully through the silky strands as he murmured _broken biscuits_ , words he couldn't recall after in a crooning, sing-song tone that would have nauseated him had he been on the receiving end. 

It seemed to calm Trip. Gradually the bigger man's shuddering breaths levelled out and the death-grip on Reed's body relaxed. Sliding his hand down over the man's nape, Malcolm rubbed the bowed back beneath its unusually subdued dark shirt in long, soothing strokes, willing himself not to notice the strength of the muscles flexing beneath his palm. For a long time, neither man spoke, one content to give, the other to receive, the solace of touch.

"Sorry, Malcolm." When he drew back Trip's eyes were swollen, his face blotchy but oddly calmer. "Dunno where all that came from."

"Don't you?" With a last quick squeeze, the Englishman stepped away, his hand still tingling pleasantly from the forbidden touch. "Better out than in, as Matron used to say - the housekeeper at school," he added, catching the Yank's bemused eyebrow-waggle. "Want me to see if there's anything left worth scrounging from the galley?"

"No thanks." Oh God, he'd have to walk through the dining room with half of Jupiter Station staring at his red eyes. Trip didn't want to guess what rumours that would send flying across Starfleet.

"It's okay." His panicked eye-slide to the door didn't pass unnoticed. This, he thought, was Malcolm after all. "They bugger off at twenty-hundred on the dot, and it's quarter-past already. You be all right?"

Would he? Tucker rolled his shoulders, vaguely surprised to feel the unrestricted motion. "I'll be better for some sleep," he said, waving the smaller man to the door before him. "Probably needed to get that off my chest."

"You've not talked to the Captain about it?"

"Nah. Johnny's been dealing with enough shit without me dumpin' all my problems at his door." Not that Archer would have complained, Trip acknowledged with a pang, but the distinctions of rank and the traumas of the last few years had changed their old, easy friendship. Talking to Johnny about something so intimate - no. He couldn't do it any more.

"And so've you, I guess," he added tiredly, aware of a reluctant warmth spreading through his stomach at the other man's mumbled demur. "See you in the morning?"

"I'm not planning to jump ship in the night." 

"Glad t' hear it, Lootenant. Sweet dreams."

"'night, Commander." If he slept at all it would be a miracle, Reed knew as he loitered, noting the renewed spring in the other man's step. His head ached and his heart felt fifteen times heavier than normal as he contemplated all Trip had revealed, the man's desperate denial of any feelings toward T'Pol replaying in his head. 

It had almost sounded sincere. 

Shaking his dark head the Englishman trudged to his own cabin and stripped, tossing his clothes with unaccustomed abandon around the room. Turning his face to the wall he closed his eyes and waited for the sleep that would not come.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Somebody's mouth outpaces his brain. It doesn't take much to change everything.

Somehow they missed each other at breakfast. And lunch. Shut in his office shuffling data around his screen, Malcolm willed himself not to notice the thick, gluey feeling that settled in his stomach as the day dragged on without a cheep from the comm. Obviously in the cold light of day Trip was mortified by his frankness. He'd probably be off the ship before space night set in.

Part of him was acutely relieved. He couldn't face another confessional without his true feelings slipping out, and now more than ever he knew that would be catastrophic.

The constant hum of the station personnel working outside his office had blended into the usual background music of beeps and hums from the consoles. The firm tread of boots approaching the threshold didn't penetrate his skull, making the quiet cough ping through him like a rifle shot. "You joining me for dinner, or are you gonna skulk down here 'til midnight?"

"Oh, erm, hello Trip, yes, just give me a minute." Good God, he was babbling like a ten-year-old with a crush, and in full view of half a dozen smirking technicians. Malcolm fumbled with his PADDs, almost deleting a whole day's work in his confusion. "I, er, good Lord, is that really the time?"

"Y' know, for a guy on vacation, you get through one helluva stack of work."

"And you don't?" The joke relaxed him and Malcolm found himself grinning up at his friend, unconsciously registering the brighter eyes and the small, bashful smile. He couldn't stay a bundle of nerves around Trip Tucker, however much he wanted to. Nerves kept him sharp, and if his guard dropped, his feelings might leak out. 

He swayed from a comradely shoulder-punch, letting the soothing sound of the Southern drawl wash over him as they walked, Tucker getting animated as he detailed his day's activities. People glanced at them as they passed, smiled and turned away, evidently amused by the loquaciousness of one and the silent attention of the other. Had they guessed his secret? Surely _somebody_ must have seen the longing on his face when he caught an unexpected glimpse of that heavenly arse!

The moment they were concealed in the captain's mess all Tucker's ready eloquence deserted him. He fiddled with his pasta, twirling spaghetti around his fork only to let it slide. Cleared his throat repeatedly. Then exhaled a gusty sigh and launched into an obviously scripted speech.

"Malcolm, I wanna apologise for goin' off the way I did last night. It's been a while since I've let myself even think about the whole screwed-up thing between me and T'Pol, and I guess I got carried away. You're a real good friend t' sit there and take it, but I took advantage of your kindness last night and it's made you uncomfortable. I'd never do that to you on purpose, Mal, and I want y' to know, I'm real sorry. I won't bore you that way again, I swear."

"Oh, Trip!" And there he was fretting his knowledge of all those gory details had made the Yank avoid him! "It wasn't kind; it's called being a friend, and God knows you've listened to enough inane burbling about my fucked-up love life in the past! I just wish there was something I could do to make things better."

"Bein' around and still _being_ my friend sure helps." A large hand wrapped around his wrist and squeezed, fingers pressing softly against the tender inner flesh. "I've never talked about me and T'Pol, but rantin' at you seems to've cleared my head. I owe ya, buddy."

"Bullshit!" The forceful demurral shook him. Even with him, Malcolm usually controlled his wayward tongue better. "You needed to get it off your chest, Trip; in fact you probably should've done it a long time ago - to the Captain, to me, even to Phlox in his capacity as unofficial ship's counsellor if you couldn't trust us!"

"Guess so." Internalising wasn't a Tucker habit, and doing it made him realise why. They just weren't good at it. "I just feel so guilty about the whole stupid mess. What in hell was I thinking?"

"We've all got our dark secrets buried somewhere."

"What, even you?"

_Oops. Open mouth, shove in two size elevens. Sideways._

The sharp-angled face opposite closed down. "Section 31, Commander," Reed rapped out. Tucker groaned.

"Mal, you can't keep kickin' your own ass over that; and you've got to admit the connection came in real handy. Harris really pulled through for us with Terra Prime."

"Well I'm glad to know I finally achieved something positive. A little nugget of gold in a pile of pig shit, eh?"

"If it helps, the Cap'n knew he was askin' a lot of you." Consumed in dark memories, Malcolm appeared remote - as untouchable as he had been the first few weeks of the mission, when the most any superior officer seemed to get from _Lieutenant Reed_ was a crisp "Aye, Sir."

"Call it my penance." The half-smile was proverbial, the cold stare that accompanied it mercifully rare, and usually directed at aliens screaming threats and waving disruptors. "I did!"

"It saved all our asses."

"It didn't help Elizabeth."

"Nothing would've helped her, Malcolm." So that had been added to the mental blacklist, Trip realised. Somehow, despite the limits of medical science, an English Armoury Officer should have saved a genetically-unstable hybrid infant's life. _Most folks'd say that's her daddy's job._

"God I'm sorry, Trip!" His thoughts must have shown - not an unusual occurrence, Tucker conceded as the other man's cutlery clattered onto the table. "How bloody insensitive am I? Moaning that I couldn't do anything for your daughter, when you... maybe you'd prefer to eat alone from now on. I can't seem to open my mouth without shoving both feet in it!"

"Funny, I was just thinkin' the same thing about me. Knowing how bad you feel over the whole Section 31 thing it was dumb of me t' jab about _dark secrets_. And - hell, I'm glad somebody's actually _mentioning_ Elizabeth, because it was starting to feel like people were ashamed to talk about her."

"More likely they were frightened of upsetting you with clodhopping crass remarks like mine."

It was irrational even for him, but that dour remark was the final straw. Tucker reared out of his seat, his sweaty palms sliding against the table's cold surface as he glowered down at his astonished friend, the veins in his neck throbbing with the force of his fury. "Dammit Malcolm, what's with this downer you've got on yourself the whole time? You're the best officer anâd the best man I know. 

"You hear that? I'm rankin' you higher than ol' Johnny right now, because nobody could have a better friend than I got in you for takin' all my garbage and not knockin' me into the middle 'f next week. So I don't wanna hear another word about how useless or dumb or incompetent you are, okay?"

"I - well, thank you, I suppose." Innate courtesy got out a suitable response, a sedate reflex at odds with the churning sensation in Reed's head and guts as the enormity of the compliment he was being paid twanged his overstretched nerves. His eyeballs stung; breathing was difficult. Trip was gazing at him, still flushed from his outburst but with such warmth - such affection - in his summery eyes it started a satisfying ache behind his ribcage, filling the hollowness he usually felt there. "I'm glad someone thinks I'm not a complete waste of space and matter."

"Jee-sus, you're doin' it again, and don't give me any of that _British self-deprecation_ shit, because I'm not buyin' it!" Impulsively Tucker seized the hand lying flaccid in Reed's lap, roughly yanking the smaller man to his feet. "There's nobody who's severed with you thinks you're anything less than one helluva good guy, Malcolm Reed - not even the MACOs, including Hayes by the end. We have faith in you. Is it so hard to have a little in yourself?"

"Apparently." He'd expected a fight. What Trip got was a defeated slump of the shoulders and a nervous dip of too-long lashes concealing the feelings he knew must swamp the expressive grey orbs. "If your own parents don't have time for you..."

"Now, Mal I'm sure that's not true." He wasn't; Jon's brief encounter had been enough to convince that astute judge the elder Reeds knew no more about their boy than his name and birthday. He watched fascinated as pearly teeth dug into a pouty lower lip.

"Well they're hardly in a position to form an opinion any more, Commander, since we haven't met in the last - oh, is it twelve years? Mind you, considering the stonking row we had over dinner that night, it's probably for the best."

"Twelve _years?_ "

"It might be more, actually." Flashing a brittle smile Malcolm broke free, almost overbalancing and powerless to protest as he was steered carefully back into a chair. "You know I was destined for the Navy, of course? Well, I scotched that one at a very early stage, despite the taunts of cowardice - my aquaphobia, I told you about that, didn't I?"

"Uh, yeah." In truth he'd been so drunk on icy bourbon at the time Trip half-thought he'd dreamed the whole thing. "Your Daddy wants t' read a few of Jon's despatches before calling you a coward - 'specially if I'm around. He's still that mad you joined Starfleet? Mad enough not to see you in twelve years?"

"Oh, he worked himself into a towering rage." Flippancy wasn't as stout a defence as formality and to his disgust Malcolm heard his voice waver. "Then I made things worse, of course. He pretty much disowned me - without making it legal, only the lawyers get rich from that kind of caper - when I yelled that the only thing I found remotely attractive about his benighted bloody _service_ was the rather dishy chap on their recruitment posters."

Trip knew it wasn't possible, but the docked starship seemed to lurch. "You're _bi?_ " he croaked.

The tinge of attractive colour emotion brought to Reed's high cheekbones drained away, leaving him bloodless as a cadaver, rooted to his seat. His lips formed a familiar single syllable before, clutching his stomach as if it ached, he lurched past the stricken engineer and out the door.

"Malcolm, wait up!" Half of Jupiter Station seemed to be watching as Trip chased his colleague across the mess, emerging into a corridor already free of ghostly British military types. "Now what in hell was that all about?" he wondered, the words echoing back to taunt him.

He couldn't think - no, Malcolm knew Charles Tucker III better than to believe an unexpected confession would change their friendship. So why in God's holy name had he bolted?

Shaking his head Trip staggered toward the turbolift, physically restraining himself at B deck from turning left toward Reed's cabin instead of right for his own. Malcolm would 'fess up eventually. He'd see to that.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a bit of agonising to go through for Trip and Malcolm.

He held himself together right until the cabin door swished shut behind him. Then he swung around, slamming his fist to crunch satisfactorily into the solid bulkhead. "Fuck!"

The hand he drew back was trembling. Tepid water seemed to swirl through his guts, lifting acid bile to the back of his throat. He'd blown it.

Contrary to popular opinion, Trip Tucker was an observant man. Now he knew part of the truth, he had to guess the rest.

He undressed on instinct, his motions the smooth, steady ones of a well-engineered machine, lay down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, willing the hot wash of humiliated heartbreak that stung his eyes to fade. Turning off the lights didn't help. Even in pitch blackness the stricken expression on Trip's face formed with crystalline clarity. How could he ever look the man in the eye again?

*

Three hours later, having given up all hope of sleep Tucker sat in front of his monitor, blind to the data that scrolled by. Malcolm's face, frozen in horror as his slip of the tongue zinged home, wavered before his sightless stare, the combination of humiliation, defeat and utter despair all too clear to one who knew him so well.

He _couldn't_ believe there was a grain of prejudice in a Tucker's makeup. He couldn't expect his friend of almost four turbulent years to turn away, disgusted by something no sane person gave a thought any more. Sure it made sense in a sick sort of way that if his Daddy reacted badly to the truth other people might too, but Trip Tucker wasn't just another person. He was the man who loved the mule-headed, over-sensitive anal idiot!

An Arctic blast seemed to sweep through his cabin. For a moment he would have sworn Enterprise had dropped from warp 5 to a dead stop. "Aw, shit!" he breathed, feeling the air inside his lungs slowly being replaced by a vacuum. "What if he knows?"

However much he told himself their relationship hadn't changed, he knew it was a bare-faced lie. He loved a man he'd always assumed was straight. Now he knew better, how could every moment they spent together not be tinged on his side with a desperate, despairing hope?

Malcolm was observant. It went with the territory for tactical officers, but the Brit's innate wariness took professional vigilance to a whole new level. He couldn't be sure a longing glance hadn't been intercepted, or a wistful sigh overheard. Add in Malcolm's obvious paranoia about his sexuality becoming public...

Not for the first time, Trip wished he could have five minutes with Stuart Reed, R.N. _It couldn't take longer than that to wring a man's neck, right?_

Flipping off his computer he dragged himself to bed and stretched out, staring at the ceiling. It didn't make sense with the initial panic fading to the back of his mind, hanging like a mist out at sea. Malcolm knew his own sexuality. If he'd guessed Trip's - and noticed any moonstruck looks - why keep putting himself in the man's company? Reed could be a nasty bastard - enough aliens could attest to that - but he was no sadist, and his tolerance of Tucker's behaviour since the first Elizabeth's death had brought him damn near canonisation in the Southerner's (and other people's - he knew what Travis whispered to Hoshi in the mess queue when he thought the Chief Engineer was out of range) estimation.

No. Terror of ravishment at his colleague's hand couldn't explain the most capable fighter on the crew fleeing like a frightened rabbit. So: what was left?

Closing his eyes Trip fought to visualise Malcolm's sharp-angled face in that sickening moment of comprehension, teasing apart the warring emotions like the delicate threads of a tightly-woven cloth. Panic; embarrassment; desolation; and running below all three, barely recognisable, a glimmer of fear. 

Fear of _him_. 

Something began to tickle through his brain, a possibility so shocking he wanted to smack himself upside the head for even considering it. Something that made as much of a weird kind of sense as anything else, but that was just dazzlingly daunting to be real.

"Aw, fuck!" His pillow thudded softly off the opposite bulkhead. Burying his face in the mattress, Trip allowed himself a single, frustrated wail. "Now I'm _never_ gonna get to sleep tonight!"

*

He intended slipping into the galley and scrounging something for breakfast before the locals came aboard, but his innards revolted violently against the first splash of mouthwash against the back of his throat so he settled for a quick scan of the deserted corridor before clambering through the nearest maintenance hatch, toolbox tucked in beneath a crumpled sleeve. There was work to be done in the aft cannon housing - delicate work he'd never entrust to some snotty-nosed greenhorn whose principal experience of the weapon came from a line drawing. The fact said greenhorn's hand would be steadier and his concentration more secure mattered nothing.

Malcolm Reed was in charge of Enterprise's armaments, and he was damned if he'd give up his place to a sharp-eyed gawker merely because his hands shook like a drunkard gone cold turkey, or that his reddened, tear-narrowed eyes would be useless in the low light of the ship's remotest corner.

Rank had its privileges. The opportunity to be a coward just happened to be among the most useful of them.

*

Trip spent the morning in such a daze he almost knocked out power to three decks by misaligning a power coupling a high school kid could have managed. Eating breakfast alone, his unsubtle questioning of the galley staff having confirmed Lieutenant Reed's conspicuous absence, set his teeth on edge and added a hundred more to the swarm of fish eagles flapping about in his stomach. Avoidance was an archaic tactic, but even the best strategists occasionally took the conventional course.

Paranoia, he realised, was contagious. By lunchtime he'd checked the launchbay, where both shuttles squatted at standby ignored by the handful of crew fine-tuning the launch systems, and every docking hatch for evidence of an unauthorised departure. 

Everything checked out and in spite of himself Tucker relaxed. Not even Malcolm Reed could hide out on a docked starship forever.

*

By day two, he was beginning to reappraise his assessment: and to squirm under the snickers of every other station technician who answered his airy _"Seen Lieutenant Reed around, crewman?"_ with a much too innocent "No, Sir." Either the man had one of those invisibility cloaks from the Harry Potter books Trip had loved as a kid or there were places on Enterprise even the Chief Engineer didn't know existed.

If there weren't steel springs being tightened in his chest by every wild speculation that entered his head, he might almost have found his friend's elusiveness funny. Instead, it made him feel sick.

Their friendship mattered. If he'd blown that, life wouldn't be worth living when they launched. A Vulcan ex he didn't love and being avoided by the man he yearned for... Heaven, he'd decided a while back, would have to wait for Trip Tucker. _Looks like I've reached the other place already._

Intermittently he tried Reed's personal comm., but of course the sneaky Limey bastard had left it on his bed - a theory confirmed by dint of an engineering override and a near cardiac arrest when somebody walked past the cabin door. 

It was at that moment, cowering in the Englishman's gleaming bathroom with both hands over his sweaty face, that Commander Charles Tucker III went mad.

He stalked toward the armoury never noticing the idlers who took one look at his thunderous face and threw themselves into the nearest emergency hatch. "You seen Lieutenant Reed?" he barked through the open door.

"Er - no, Sir." The willowy Jamaican closest glanced down, evidently fascinated by her painted nails. "He's not been down here all day. Can anyone else..."

"No thanks." He slammed open the comm. panel, the tweak of a wire enough to activate a channel shipwide. "Malcolm Reed, if you don't get your skinny ass t' the Cap'n's mess in fifteen minutes, I'm gonna have your sorry hide for a wall-hanging, you got that? Tucker out."

Before he could close the line everybody aboard heard the clang of spanner striking console as it slipped from numb fingers behind him. With a baleful glare that dared his audience to question, Trip spun on his heel and stormed out of the room.

"You think they've broken up?"

"Sssh, he'll hear you!"

_Broken up? Ha! Chance, as Mal would say, would be a fine thing!_

So why, as he slowed to await the turbolift and the crimson fog of insanity began to lift from his mind, did he feel as if he might just have caused exactly that?


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A necessary conversation takes place.

Ten minutes later, steadily wearing a groove in the deck plating, he began to suspect the damned Englishman really had spirited himself off the ship. Outside in the main mess he could hear a thrum of excited voices leaking through the gap beneath the door, shrill squeals of laughter cutting through the unruly-classroom chatter. Even Soval wouldn't have picked out the key words, regularly repeated, any clearer: and that was before one deep voice right outside exclaimed it was obvious two guys so much in love were going to have a _passionate_ relationship.

Dizzily he collapsed against the table, the sharp edges of the room blurred with tears. If it was so obvious to strangers how he felt, Malcolm must know. 

He'd just known the wisp floating around the back of his head had been too good to be true.

The door opened fully and his heart clunked into his boots. "You wished to see me, Commander?"

Trip swung around, his lips already shaping to form the apology he figured he needed to start with. One look at the miserable shadow of an Armoury Officer struggling to hit _Attention_ in front of him and his prepared speech went right out of his head. "Jeez Malcolm, you look like hell!"

The younger man inched into the room just far enough for the door to close behind him, every small movement pinched with pain. His eyes, usually so vividly expressive, were opaque, sunk into bruised hollows above cheekbones that seemed even more defined than usual; his alabaster complexion had a waxen finish and his thin, well-drawn lips were tight enough to look bloodless. "Well thank you for your opinion, Commander. If that was all, Sir..."

"Malcolm, please. Don't go."

Trip wasn't sure which of them was more surprised the appeal worked. Reed paused in the act of turning away, peeping over his shoulder with an uncertainty that made the engineer's pulse leap. There was something almost hopeful about the lieutenant's hesitation and it made all the crazy optimism of the Tuckers bloom inside Trip's pummelled heart.

"Why did you run, Mal?" he asked softly, one hand extending toward the wary brunet. "C'mon, this is _me!_ You can't think knowing you're bi could make me think less of you!"

"I..." His throat closed up alarmingly. Malcolm blinked, tensing every muscle against the surge of emotion that buckled his knees under that kind, unblinking aqua gaze. "I didn't... I mean..."

"Hey, it's alright." The vulnerability he kept strictly concealed was naked for once, and it broke the tenuous hold Trip had on control. With a lunge he had the startled Brit in his arms, pressing the pale face against his racing heart as he rocked on the balls of his feet, one hand winding its way into the silkiness of Malcolm's dark hair. "There ain't nothing you could tell me'd change the way I feel. Hell, it's not like I've got any right to be prejudiced, seein' as how I swing both ways too."

"Really?"

He thought he was so damned stoic, Tucker thought. So good at hiding everything behind that supercilious mask, and yet... one little word could betray him. 

_Maybe I wasn't so far off the mark after all._

He eased back to rest his butt against the table, leaning with the other man cradled trustingly against his chest and listening to laboured breathing that hitched every now and then as Malcolm fought for control. "Yeah, really. Ask the Cap'n. First time I met him, I hit on him. He still teases me about it sometimes."

Malcolm rocked back on his heels until he stood straight, his half-closed eyes flying open. Bereft without his warm weight within them, Trip let his arms drop. "You're kidding."

"I wish! Course I was drunk at the time, because if I'd been sober I'd've seen right off he's not my type, even if he wasn't straight."

"Oh."

Helpless to do anything but, Malcolm slipped into the seat indicated by a jab of Floridian finger. His fingernails bit deep into his palms, the small stab of pain all that persuaded him this was not another tantalizing dream. His head felt woollen; his body moved in accordance with the will of some mysterious power quite separate from himself. 

"Please don't ever run away from me, Malcolm." Something warm flared out of Trip's belly as he watched the meek obedience of his most unruly subordinate. The cold edge had thawed from the man's stern features, and his eyes had regained a glimmer of their usual stormy magnificence. "I hate it when you do that."

The tip of a pink tongue swept Reed's lips. "Why?"

_Hot damn. Was that an invitation?_

His flesh was prickling everywhere and deep in his groin there was a building pressure to match that swelling inside his skull. Grey eyes the exact colour of the turbulent North Atlantic were shot through with silver lights as they held his, their hypnotic power alone enough to bring the truth bubbling up to his parted lips. 

"Because I'm fond of you, Malcolm Reed. _Real_ fond," he whispered. "And I'm kinda hopin', given the way you panicked and all, that maybe you could feel the same way about me."

"Please don't joke about it, Commander." It was too good to be true, and miracles didn't happen to men named Reed. He shifted in his seat, gnawing his bottom lip until Tucker could see a droplet of blood form to be absently swept away with a nervous lick. "I - it's bad enough you obviously know how I feel, and I'd sooner die than make you uncomfortable, and - oh, bollocks! I'd better go."

"Stay right where you are, Lieutenant!" Dammit, the man had him using ranks, and off-duty he hated doing that! "You know me better than to think I'd fuck around like that, dontcha? I - I've been treadin' on eggshells around you for so long, afraid of scarin' you off because I never thought - I always hoped if you liked guys there might be something between us, but... Gawd Malcolm, when you told me that, it was every dream I've had the last few years come true!"

"Considering your experience with the Vulcan Temptress, I find that rather hard to believe."

The acidity in the words made both men wince. "She had me all confuzzled for a while," Trip acknowledged, slowly allowing his lungs to expand. Possibly the only good thing to come from his intimacy with T'Pol were the hints she'd given on keeping his cool: even if she'd never expected it to help in quite this situation, he thought grimly. "All my dreams were getting tangled - her telepathic stimulations mixin' themselves up with my feelings for you. Yeah, for a while I believed I was in love with her."

"You certainly gave a convincing impersonation."

"Ouch. I never meant to hurt you, Malcolm."

The Englishman took a deep breath and lifted his head. "I know," he said simply.

"I'm so sorry."

He looked at the handsome face before him, kissable lips quivering and summer-sky eyes bright with tears. Took in the hunch of the broad shoulders and the dishevelled, finger-combed hair. And it all, unbelievably, made sense. "I know that, too."

"For all the shit I threw at y' when Lizzie died, and what happened with T'Pol... all the times I wasn't there for y' when Hayes was drivin' you nuts and the Cap'n wouldn't listen to reason. I never wanted to hurt you."

"It's all right." Deep down it always had been Malcolm realised, aware of a thawing sensation deep inside. Yes, he had understood and forgiven - not something Reeds were renowned for - but to know that Trip understood how deep the pain had run somehow washed away its last traces. "I set myself up for it. I just wanted you to know I cared."

"Just never how much, huh?" The strength of the other man's feelings was suddenly clear and Tucker was awed by the unselfish devotion he had taken for granted. "Most folks would've given up on me, seein' how bad I treated you."

"I'm not _most folks_ ; and I don't give up that easily." The room was turning slowly, but as long as he kept his eyes on the handsome face opposite, Reed discovered, it had no effect on his notoriously delicate stomach. Those lovely golden features lit with a soft, wondering smile.

"That mean you're givin' me another chance?" The timidity of the question brought, had he only been able to see it, a similar expression to the Englishman's face. "I've been such a jackass...."

"You've been a human being, love."

Both men watched enthralled as a slim hand stretched out to cover Trips clasped ones. "In that case," the engineer murmured, as if raising his voice might break the spell he felt winding over them, "will you have breakfast with me tomorrow?"

"Of course I - oh!" The fingers curled over his hands twitched. Malcolm peeped from beneath coyly lowered lashes, his shyness only partly feigned. "Are you asking me on a date?"

Trip grinned hugely. "Yeah."

"Why?"

Only Malcolm Reed would call a man _love_ , then demand an explanation for a date offer.

Trip loved him all the more for that contrariness. 

"Because I'm attracted to you, Malcolm,2 he replied with exaggerated patience, turning his hands to cradle the dark-haired man's "You're smart, funny, charming and mighty fine-lookin' too. And because when I'm attracted to someone and I wanna get to know them better, I find it kinda helps to date."

To his great surprise, Malcolm burst out laughing. "We already _know_ each other possibly too well. Nearly dying on a freezing shuttle, getting tied up in our undies in an alien basement together, not to mention fighting our way across the Delphic Expanse... we must've seen the worst of each other in the last four years."

"And maybe the best as well." It wasn't the reaction he'd hoped for, but Trip wasn't worried. Malcolm seldom did what people expected. _All part of the charm._

"I can say anything to you, Mal. Hell, I'm already closer to you than I am to anyone else, even Johnny - and don't you dare mention that condescendin' damn Vulcan. I know you're the bravest, most loyal, smart-assed prickly bastard of a friend a guy could ever have, but I'd really like - if you're interested - to get to know you in all the other ways too."

There it was again; the swift circuit of tongue around perfect pink lips. "Care to elaborate?"

"I'd like to know how you look in the morning, all soft and rumpled from sleep. What colour your eyes go when you're just about to come; where a touch gets you all fired up. I wanna know if you snore; whether you prefer tea or coffee before breakfast, and where in God's holy name you got the idea of puttin' peanut butter all over your pancakes. I wanna find out if you're ticklish anywhere, and I wanna know if there are any movies that make Mister Cool howl like a little kid. I want to know _you_ , Malcolm. All of you, and now I've said it, I wanna know how it makes you feel."

For a delirious moment he saw the man's answer blaze across his face. "Overwhelmed," Malcolm whispered, lacing his fingers between Trip's and gripping tight. "Flattered. I - I want to know you that way too. I want to know how you look half asleep; how you got your nickname..."

"That was the preacher who baptised me." He'd been surprised how few people had ever questioned it. "Were you..."

"By the Admiralty's chaplain: Granddad pulled in a favour. You were saying?"

"Mal, if I'm gonna get to know you the way I want, you're gonna hafta get over this compulsion to change the subject." With the wag of a finger, Trip allowed his beloved to get away with it. _Again_. "Well, my granddaddy was always called Charles; Dad was known as Charlie, so what were they gonna call me? Grandpa Johnson started callin' me Chuck, but Momma hated it. The way Dad tells it, when the preacher looked at us and announced _Charles Tucker in triplicate!_ she dang near dropped me in the font and yelled, _that's it! He's gonna be Trip!_ "

"And so you have been ever since?" They were still holding hands, Malcolm noticed absently. It was making him feel warm all the way to his toes.

Trip was rocking from one buttock to the other, peeking at him from beneath golden lashes. He cleared his throat.

"Breakfast tomorrow then?"

"A date?"

He wasn't usually this slow but Trip was willing to forgive him; he wanted no misunderstandings this time, and their past interactions had amply proven the old saying about their nations being divided by a common language. "Yeah. Pick you up at oh-seven twenty five?"

Joy fizzed through his chest. It was all Malcolm could do to pull himself upright without breaking into a silly jig. "I'll be ready. You heading back to quarters?"

"Yeah." He got up without disconnecting their hands, and it occurred to Reed that the older man must be enjoying the sensation of work-leathered skin against his palm as much as he was. "Uh - guess I better let go, right?"

"We've not started dating yet." As the door opened he could hear the clatter of cooking implements in the galley and instinctively he ducked back to take the subordinate's station at Tucker's shoulder. The blond flashed a knowing grin back at him.

"Tomorrow," he whispered, letting the promise linger all the way to the turbolift. It still echoed through in his head fifteen minutes later, naked, aroused and tingling with anticipation in his dark cabin, chasing the most important question like a mischievous child through his brain. 

"What in _hell_ am I gonna wear in the morning?"


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dating. However keen the parties, it's always an unnerving experience at the start!

At oh-seven-fifteen he was stripping off his fourth outfit, glaring at the crumpled heap of discarded clothing on his bunk. None of his jeans were smart enough. His Hawaiians were all too bright - Malcolm tutted every time he saw them, and while it was partly habit Trip accepted they weren't exactly a match for the Brit's more understated style.

Next he'd tried a pair of smart charcoal slacks teamed with a crisp white shirt. One look in the narrow bathroom mirror told him he was trying too hard, but a more casual soft peach shirt looked all wrong too. "Dammit! I might as well wear uniform!"

_Well, why not? It's comfortable. Mal's been wearing uniform all vacation._

He was unpleasantly surprised by the renewed confidence that bloomed as he studied himself, carefully adjusting his commander's pips. He was a Starfleet officer, and a damn fine one. 

It was certainly a more reassuring self-image than that of indecisive jerk gnawing off his own nails at the prospect of a first date.

Which didn't stop him dawdling down to Malcolm's cabin, his innards churning with tepid water; then hesitating with his finger on the doorchime, checking his watch to make sure he wasn't early - too keen - or late - disrespectful. If he'd been this nervous since his first high school prom, he'd been too drunk to remember it.

He barely had time to press the buzzer before the door slipped open and he found Malcolm, perfectly groomed and smiling shyly. In uniform. _Praise be!_

"Morning."

"Uh, hi, Malcolm."

They stood on either side of the threshold, carefully avoiding each other's eyes. Tongues swept lips in harmony. "I, er, suppose we should be going," Reed volunteered.

"After you." Tucker stepped back. "Um - you sleep well?"

"Reasonably. You?"

"Same, I guess."

"Good."

At the turbolift he found himself rocking from one foot to the other. Malcolm tapped his fingers against the bulkhead, and from the corner of his eye Trip could see those sharp white teeth worrying away at his lips. The Englishman sneaked a glance his way: hastily, Trip forced his eyes front.

_At least I'm not the only one jumpy as a duckling in a fox's den!_

They reached the mess in silence, both men secretly relieved to find a pair of station staff loitering outside the doors before them. "Starting early, Mister Hansen," Reed observed mildly. The taller of the two flushed to the roots of his silver-blond hair. 

"I've been worrying about those recalibrations to the targeting array, sir," he mumbled. Malcolm patted his arm.

"If you'd like, I'll pop in and take a look later this morning," he volunteered. The young man brightened. 

"If you're sure - I mean, you're really on vacation, aren't you?"

"Busman's holiday. Ah, good morning, Mister McInally. Tea brewed?"

Usually Malcolm was the one who tensed up around strangers. To see him unbend in their presence, joking and smiling as he usually only did for his most intimate friends, sliced like a mek'leth through Trip's gut. "We goin' through to the Cap'n's mess?" he whispered, close enough to feel the younger man's start.

"Of course." A second splash of milk landed in his teacup, Malcolm's hand unsteady as he returned jug to counter. "D' you mind if I just grab some peanut - oh, thanks."

"You're welcome." The minute he'd seen his companion taking pancakes, Trip had spooned a healthy dollop onto his plate. "They're watchin' us."

"I've been trying to tell myself they always do." He maintained a measured pace crossing to the smaller room, which pleased him. And only at the last moment did he give into the urge to glance back at the handsome beast in his wake.

Suddenly the pancakes, eggs and bacon he'd been anticipating looked as edible as dollops of lard dribbled with beagle blood. His mouth dried up. "Erm - I'm not really as hungry as I thought."

"Me neither." They stood behind their usual chairs for several seconds. "After you," the blond invited weakly.

"Oh, right. Thanks." Tea. That would lubricate his throat and occupy his mouth. If, Malcolm considered, he could only stop his hand trembling long enough to lift the bloody cup.

Trip had clearly had the same idea, setting about his coffee and toast with a single-minded determination that precluded any attempt at speech for several minutes. "You, uh, plannin' on spending the day in the armoury, then?" he tried eventually.

"It looks that way. You?"

"Guess I'll go to my office."

"Oh."

Malcolm's downward glance snagged halfway on Trip's upward one. The American's mouth twitched.

Their snorts of laughter clashed over the table. "Listen to us!" the engineer marvelled, wiping his teary eyes. "Jeez, you'd think we'd been set up by a friend!"

"You certainly wouldn't think we've been giving each other merry hell for almost four years," Reed conceded into his napkin. "Christ, if we were at home we'd be onto the unseasonable weather or the shocking price of bread by now!"

"Tea, surely," Tucker countered with a jab toward his friend's cup.

"We're not in Boston, thank you; and if anything's getting tossed over the side it'll be your hideous shirt collection, not my proper British beverage!"

"Hey, why do you think I'm in uniform?"

Malcolm caught his hand and carried it over to brush his cheek. "Security, I suppose. Same as me."

"Pretty much." Trip swung their joined hands his way, ghosting Malcolm's knuckles against his jaw. "What's this about recalibrating the targeting array?"

"It's minor, but sims show we can improve accuracy by 0.3 microns. I did copy you in on my report to the captain..."

Even features twisted into a clown's grimace. "Oops. I'll dig it outta my files. It's not like I got work pilin' up on my desk."

"I should think not. We _are_ on leave, after all."

"Says the man who's spent the last three weeks sewn into uniform!"

"At least I've blended in; unlike you, Commander Fancy-Dress Contest. Did you know they've nicknamed you that?"

"I've been called worse." As the brunet dug with enthusiasm into his scrambled eggs, Trip could feel himself start to relax. "We can do this, Malcolm. We know each other. This... dating thing only gets awkward if we let it, yeah?"

"No reason to do that." Common sense from Commander Tucker. Just as well we're already dead stopped. "I do want this, Trip - this _dating thing_ , I mean."

"Me too. You want a refill?"

His heart almost cracked at the tender, grateful smile Malcolm sent him. "Please."

"Be right back." It was oh, so tempting to lean down and kiss those sweetly upturned lips, but Trip restrained himself, sauntering into the main mess to collect more tea and toast. Granny Tucker had been fond of saying patience brought its own rewards, and he intended to savour them to the utmost - soon.

No Tucker male was that patient, after all. 

By the time he got back Malcolm had produced a pocket PADD and begun tapping buttons, a small frown creasing his forehead. "Anything good?" Trip enquired amiably.

"Just work." Without hesitation the younger man pushed the PADD across their table, indicating the top line of data with a fingertip. "I'm wondering; if we tweak the sensor array, could we divert a smidgen more power into the targeting scanners? It might extend the range by a dozen or so kilometres."

"Lemme borrow this and I'll look into it." All right, it wasn't getting him any closer to the things he really wanted to know about the man but common interests were another factor in the growth of Trip's feelings for his workaholic colleague, and right now he'd discuss the innermost workings of phase pistols with enthusiasm if it would keep Reed relaxed and animated in his presence. 

Their plates were cleared much too soon. Giving his back a lazy stretch, Malcolm stood, sweeping their dishes onto his tray. "I suppose, since I promised Hansen, I really should wander down to the armoury."

"And I've got something to be doin' now too." He pocketed the PADD and would have reached for the tray, but Malcolm was ahead of him. He cocked his head and went for his most winning smile. "Guess this means you're too proper to get it on on a first date, right?"

"When I'm hoping there'll be a second - definitely." The serenity that swathed him quite startled Reed, but the instant straightening of Tucker's broad shoulders confirmed its justification. "I, er, wouldn't say no to a kiss goodbye, mind."

"Me neither." The Brit was smiling, tranquil joy brightening his magnificent eyes. Ever so slowly, still waiting for wakefulness to dash him with ice water, Trip stooped with his arms hanging at his sides, unthreatening, to press his mouth against the surprising softness of the smaller man's.

"Oh!" It was the slightest exhalation but it parted those sweet pink lips and before either man could think better of it Trip dipped his tongue into the gap, lightly stroking. The response was instantaneous.

Malcolm's arms locked around his trunk, mouth opening wide in erotic invitation. A warm tongue twined itself sinuously around his. Trip closed his eyes, letting the ship tilt on her axis as gravity went gloriously offline.

"Oh, boy," he whispered, bringing his fingers to his tingling lips in imitation of the brunet's sweetly bemused gesture as they broke apart. "You on for second date tonight, then? Dinner here, then a movie in my quarters?"

"I don't shag on a second date either, if that's what you're suggesting." Tucker suspected his man was aiming for coy, but with his flushed face, dilated pupils and breathy tone Malcolm looked and sounded almost wanton. 

And regretful, he decided, excitement making him reckless. "Okay, how about lunch here, 1230 hours? Then dinner's date three, and that's a relationship, right?"

"You're incorrigible." _And irresistible. And utterly bloody shaggable against the captain's dinner table if I don't get a grip on myself and get out of here._ "You don't think we're in danger of moving too fast or anything?"

Palms uppermost, Trip beamed at him. "Darlin', I've been waiting over three years for a date! It's not like I've gotta make up my mind whether these feelings are real or anything. I love you, and if sayin' it on a first date's too soon - tough."

Love. Trust Trip to come right out with it and to hell with the consequences.

Well, he deserved equal courage in return. Taking the engineer's hand Malcolm raised it to his mouth, feathering a kiss across the knuckles. "After all these years dancing around, I suppose it's only logical that we face facts," he said, a lightning flash of joy lancing through him at the happiness gracing that lovely golden face. "I'll see you for lunch - darling."

Before the temptation of the captain's table could become too much he snatched up his loaded tray and sashayed out into the deserted mess, leaving a gaping Trip Tucker to pinch the back of his own hand in disbelief. 

1230 hours couldn't come soon enough.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trip finally gets to know Malcolm in some of the ways he's been dreaming of. It can't all be sweetness and light, can it?

Dinner was consumed quietly - unlike their boisterous lunch date - before Trip took Malcolm's hand and led him through their deserted ship to his cabin, where the lights were already dimmed and the first frame of a twenty-first century espionage thriller wavered on the vidscreen. Two large plastic bowls stood at either end of the bunk: one filled with marshmallows, the other, Malcolm gathered, popcorn. "We've got beer or Coke, so take your pick," his host invited expansively as he pushed him toward the bed. "And yes, before you ask: I've been shopping on the station. Can't have movie night without popcorn."

"Fair enough." Soft drinks tonight, Malcolm decided, giving the red plastic cap of the nearest bottle a vicious twist. He wanted a clear head for whatever more adult delights Trip might have in mind.

"Lighting okay?" At his nod of affirmation the Southerner set the show in motion and slouched down beside him on the edge of the bunk, absently leaning over for the marshmallow bowl. Under cover of the music's ominous rise Malcolm guided it across onto his lap. "Thanks."

Ten minutes later and the action on screen had faded to the edge of Trip's mind, all his concentration required to savour the solid strength of Malcolm Reed's denim-covered thigh wedged hard against his own as the smaller man shuffled into a comfortable position that just happened to bring his head close to Trip's shoulder. It was only natural that the blond's arm should come up and settle around the brunet, hugging him lightly.

Inevitable that Malcolm would expel a quiet sigh and let his head drop back onto that solid pillow, his eyes half-closing as contentment seeped through his bloodstream. Studying his tranquil face, Trip began to wonder when - _if_ \- he had ever seen that bundle of paranoid British energy look so utterly at peace.

Methodically bringing popcorn or marshmallow chunks from bowl to mouth he let himself lean against the bulkhead, drawing his neighbour back. At length an empty dish clunked from his lap, allowing him to shift his weight onto his left side, pressing it harder against Malcolm.

The Englishman emitted a low sound that came close to a purr, blinking as he raised his face to smile at the taller man. "Enjoyin' the movie?" Trip murmured, fascinated by the momentary appearance of a tongue tip. Malcolm arched up, his answer a warm breeze against parted lips.

"What movie?"

"Dunno." His other arm came around to encircle the dark-haired man, their mouths already open to meld in a fierce, possessive kiss that deepened as they fell backward to land full length on the bunk, rolling over and back with limbs entangled. "Holy shit, Malcolm!" Trip gasped, his eyes popped by the first brush of their over-stimulated groins through two velvet layers of softened denim. He shoved a hand beneath the lieutenant's sensuous cashmere sweater, the heat of the silky skin across contracting abdominal muscles burning him right through to the marrow. "I want...."

"Aaahhh, Trip!" Their cocks met again as he shifted, digging his buttocks into the mattress with legs slightly spread, inviting the engineer's full weight to cradle between his thighs. Wild with need Malcolm clawed past the barrier of his lover's pale blue sweatshirt, thrusting his splayed palms onto the enticing wall of muscle beneath an intriguing mat of hair. Over the drumming blood in his temples he was aware of one urgent thought. 

_Too many clothes._

When a pair of clumsy hands attacked his waistband he realised Trip had reached the same conclusion. Then it was all clashing fingers and nipping teeth, nails scraping sensitised flesh and two rock-hard erections ramming together: a symphony of groans and incoherent cries as the smaller body surged up to meet the larger and the liquid sensation swilling through Trip's groin erupted to possess his whole body. Caught up in the intensity of his orgasm he barely registered the stiffening of the man beneath him; didn't hear the muffled groan against his shoulder as Malcolm's seed spurted hot and sticky over his already sodden midriff.

Drifting like a leaf on the breeze the Brit clutched the solid weight above him, his pleasure-scrambled brain cells reluctantly beginning to reconnect enough for the wet mumble of a voice against the crook of his neck to penetrate his golden haze. "Damn, I'm sorry... so sorry Malcolm, I jus' couldn't..."

"Trip?" If he concentrated, Reed discovered he could just control his limbs enough to cup the golden head between his hands and lift it, bringing a face softened by release and still twisted with embarrassment to meet his cloudy eyes. "Why? Oh God!"

Mortified horror lanced his happy bubble and blinking hard he tried to wriggle out from beneath Tucker's flaccid body. "You're regretting it already."

"Hell no!" Even covered in come, his movements slowed by the lingering haze of orgasm Malcolm moved like greased lightning, and grabbing at him as he slithered clear reminded Trip of chasing smoke with his mother's gardening trowel. He threw a leg over the escaping lieutenant, pinning him down on his hip long enough for Trip to slide closer, catching the sharp chin in a gentle hand as they came to rest with chests almost brushing. "I mean - Jeez, Malcolm, I've imagined our first time so often...."

"Really?" His heart lurched. "I never thought..."

"Darlin' I'm in love with you. Course I'm gonna fantasize." Amused, Trip stroked gently across the Brit's chest, rubbing outward to snag the puckered nipples. Malcolm gasped. "Ooooh, sensitive there, are y'?"

"A bit." Classic British understatement, Trip discerned as his lover's fingers set to work drawing patterns through the mess on his belly. 

"And in my fantasies it's always been sweet, hot and romantic," he murmured, swooping in for a slow, sloppy kiss. "Then the first time I touch you, I just... lose it."

"Oh, love." Overcome, Malcolm dragged the larger man into a crushing hug, burying damp eyes against the sweaty tangle of blond hair. "It _was_ bloody hot, and as for perfect - of course it was. It was _real_."

Something in the way he said the word tightened up every sex-softened muscle and Trip's head snapped back just in time to catch the painful twinge of shame and self-disgust that crossed his partner's finely-chiselled face. "Sure felt real enough to me," he said, carefully neutral. If he wanted to talk, Malcolm would. Pushing, he had worked out much too slowly for an intelligent man, only triggered that rarest of Reed tactics, the full retreat.

He couldn't stand that. Not now.

_Not ever again._

"That's why it was perfect." And why he had needed it so badly, Malcolm conceded, he'd lost control like never before. "I - the last time I went with a man it was just..."

"Sex?" Trip suggested, resuming his absent-minded caressing. Heedless, Malcolm arched into his hands, long lashes sweeping down as he nibbled his swollen lips. "Heck, I understand that. I've mostly done relationships with women before; the guys were usually just quick fucks."

"Business."

The hand on his flank stilled, but when he risked a peep into those wide blue eyes they were filled with compassion. "Section 31?" Trip guessed, careful to keep the surge of fury through his core out of his neutral tone. 

When Malcolm nodded he resumed his stroking, easing one hand between their bodies while the other swept Reed's straight, strong back, subtly bringing them closer. With a defiant tilt of the head, storm-grey eyes latched onto ocean-blue.

"Ever heard of the H.D.L?"

Blue eyes narrowed, bringing small creases into prominence at their corners. With a fingertip, Malcolm smoothed them away. "Humanity's Defence League or somethin'?" Trip tried.

" _Human_ Defence League. A kind of proto-Terra Prime - or that's what Starfleet feared about six years ago, before anyone had ever heard of Mister Paxton's mob. A man named Kenneth N'kwale was touted as their leading theorist. Harris sent me to infiltrate the organisation - get _close_ to the main players."

His lips twisted into a parody of his usual wry half-smile. "They obviously knew N'kwale's tastes. He flirted with me."

"And you did your duty to Starfleet." It was all Trip could do to keep up with the comforting caresses that were encouraging his lover to talk when all he wanted was to crush the man in his arms and swear he'd never have to suffer those horrors again. He caught a nipple between thumb and forefinger, heedlessly working the little nub to hardness. 

Malcolm's voice was deeper when he answered. "Of course. We ended up in bed."

"God Malcolm, did he hurt you?" Agitation tightened his grip on the nipple, sending an arrow of heat deep into Malcolm's groin. The agonised expression on Trip's handsome face blurred. 

"N-no," he sighed, thrusting himself full-length against the taller man, every muscle pinging with sensation at the slide of still-damp skin. "He was - oh God Trip touch me, please! He thought he was my first - couldn't have been more careful but - mmmm, it wasn't _real_."

"This is." Though he kept his fondling casual Trip was increasing the pressure, seeking out his partner's likeliest hot spots and earning a gratifyingly wanton reaction. Malcolm rolled onto his back, his legs falling into a natural V. Half-lidded eyes dark as molten platinum wandered lazily over his lover's intent face, and the last lingering tension of confession leeched away.

"Take me," he whispered, linking his hands at Trip's nape. The Southerner's throat tightened as painfully as his aching balls.

"Mal, are you sure?" he croaked scanning those well-defined features. Reed's lips parted in a sultry smile.

"Very sure," he pledged, trailing a fingertip around to ghost over the slightly stubbled line of the blond's jaw. His other hand clutched the engineer's ass, fingers firmly kneading the taut cheeks. Trip sucked in a breath.

"No pretence," he murmured, dipping in to kiss the wits right out of his lover, his own dissolving at the eager thrust of the compact form beneath him. "Just us, _for_ us. Yeah?"

"Yes." Trust Trip to understand exactly what he needed: his honesty as much as the magnificent dick that butted his crotch with the Yank's every small move. A pair of talented hands swept southward, a wickedly clever mouth nipping, sucking, licking in their wake and he surrendered himself gladly to the starbursts of sensation they evoked, soft moans bleeding through his puckered lips to encourage more. Something slipped behind his balls, feathering against his narrow entrance and the moan became a full-blown cry.

"Easy, darlin'." Trip spat onto his fingers to moisten the initial intrusion, suddenly grateful for the cataclysm that had swept him before, the effect of which only strengthened his need to do right by his adorable lover now. Blindly he groped into the top drawer of his bedside unit, plucking out the nondescript thin tube by feel and liberally dousing one sweaty hand while the other restrained the urgent movement of Malcolm's body. "I gotcha. We're gonna do this right, okay?"

"Mmm-hmm." Floating in a glinting sea of sensation Malcolm smiled hazily, warmth bubbling up in his belly at the sight of Trip Tucker's wet hands disappearing between his legs. Skilled fingers parted his cheeks and he arched off the mattress, offering himself with a trustfulness the American knew instinctively he had shown to no other. Cautious, he probed beyond the firm circle of muscle, dropping his face into the brunet's shoulder to muffle his awestruck moan.

By the time he'd added a second finger, and then a third, Malcolm was cursing softly, bumping back onto his hand in mindless need. Silky inner skin flexed against his searching touch and with a soft grin he pressed deeper, seeking out the special spot guaranteed to reduce his man to a whimpering, helpless puddle of pleasure.

"Yes!"

The body around his hand jerked as liquid fire speared the length of Malcolm's spine. "Like that?" Trip questioned, too far gone to wonder if that hoarse, deepened voice was really his. 

"Oh, yes." Letting his head drop back to the pillow Malcolm's features relaxed into a slow-uncurling smile as his gaze connected with Trip's rampant erection. "Want a hand with that?"

"I'll manage."

His voice went up an octave as he prepared himself: more, Trip suspected, at the vision of Malcolm idly playing with his own genitals than the stab of sensation through his cock. "And let me deal with that, okay?"

Absent-minded masturbation ceased and Malcolm reached up, arms wide open as his spread legs. "Gladly," he purred as Trip eased forward, connecting them from forehead to feet. 

He had to pause a moment, scrabbling for enough control to part his lover's cheeks as Malcolm abandoned the last of his restraint and hooked his legs around Trip's trim waist. The heat radiating off the smaller man was intense, its pull magnetic, and deftly Trip positioned himself to begin his slow and steady push home.

Small huffing sounds emerged from his partner, lengthening into a half-startled mew when the broad head of Trip's cock popped through his loosened hole. Blunt fingertips burned into his shoulders and he hesitated, waiting for the subtle signs of relaxation around Malcolm's eyes and mouth to accompany the softening of the walls engulfing him. "Almost there," he breathed.

"Mmmm, yes." The initial burn faded away, leaving Malcolm feeling stretched and wonderfully full, warmth cascading over him as Trip rocked just enough to send small spirals of sensation up into his bowels. His death-grip on his lover's shoulders relaxed and he shifted, pushing for deeper penetration with a blissful smile curving his kiss-bruised lips. "More. Please."

It was, Tucker realised later, the politeness, so perfectly _Lieutenant Reed_ that broke him. Finesse forgotten, he pulled back to thrust himself forcefully home, breath escaping in a sibilant hiss as Malcolm bucked in greeting. His mouth crashed down to claim the Englishman's, their teeth scraping with the ferocity of the kiss as Malcolm's cry rolled into his throat. Roughly he snatched the throbbing hardness between them, pulling in counterpoint to the thrusts of tongue and cock.

The roughness of leathered palm against his aching shaft merged with repetitive pressure against his prostate sending Malcolm over the edge into ecstasy, his fingers and toes curling in the volcanic heat of climax. The clench of muscle around his penis was all it took to have Trip tumbling in his wake, the galaxy blasting itself apart as he collapsed onto his partner's shuddering body, burying his face in the crook of Reed's neck. Soft, incoherent mumbles huffed against his ear and he snuggled in closer, lost in the fluffy torpor of receding orgasm until Malcolm made a slight movement. "Damn!"

"Don't go." Drowsily Malcolm tried to rewrap his limbs around Trip's torso but for once the engineer was quicker, the friction as he eased out of the brunet's body causing both men to moan. Rolling onto his side, Trip scooped his lover close, tucking the messy dark head in beneath his chin.

"'m goin' nowhere babe, but I don't wanna crush y'," he rumbled, only half-wakened by the cheeky nip of teeth against the base of his throat. "Stay with me?"

"Oh, yes please." It occurred to Malcolm that he might never find the strength to leave this bed again. 

As he slipped from satiation into sleep, he groggily remembered he was supposed to be bothered about that.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the morning after - an element of romance Trip Tucker never ventured toward in his fantasies. Going in with no expectations is sometimes a very good thing.

Before he was even half-awake he knew something was wrong. The sheets were cold. "Trip?"

"Morning, Handsome." Warmth ruffled his hair as a pair of soft lips brushed through the unruly tumble. Blinking the sleep away Malcolm lifted his face toward them, an invitation greedily accepted before Trip stepped back, his smile sweetly sheepish as he directed his lover's eyes to the array of dishes surrounding a plastic bucket filled with ice and an unmistakable green glass bottle in the middle of his desk. "I didn't mean to wake you - just been fixin' us some breakfast."

"Champagne and strawberries?" The sheet slithered down his torso like a lover's caress as Reed propped himself up against the bulkhead, the grin his lips concealed dancing bright through still-hooded silver eyes. "Confident, were we?"

Tucker shrugged, puckering up into his best aw, shucks grin. "Just practisin' that whole boy scout _bein' prepared_ thing."

"Eagle scout," Malcolm corrected automatically, the flick of a hand hint enough for the other man to step back, the breath trapped in his throat at the sight of a naked armoury officer sliding from his bunk. "Mind if I borrow your shower?"

"Help yourself." 

A long index finger ran down the middle of his bare chest, just dipping below the line of his boxers before skipping a retreat all the way up to rest on his lips. "Thanks. Oooh, whipped cream and chocolate sauce! We're going to make an awful mess of the sheets."

One golden brow twitched. "Bit late to worry about that, darling," Trip drawled, popping a juicy berry between his teeth and swaying close. On a laughing snort, Malcolm nipped half of it away before heading for the compact bathroom. "There's a spare shaver in the closet - toothbrush, too," he hollered.

"Ta, ducks."

Shaking his head, Trip popped the champagne cork and set the bottle back to continue chilling. To think he'd woken with his guts in a knot, afraid to breathe on his slumbering lover for fear he'd dissolve or worse, wake up and run like a violated virgin. _The morning after_ was a part of the fantasy he'd always blotted out, anticipating the worst.

Which just went to show, he acknowledged as he slipped out of his underwear and stretched along the bunk, that predicting Malcolm's moods didn't need foreknowledge of the man: it needed a crystal ball.

Smothered in soap Malcolm stood beneath a steaming jet of water watching his blurry reflection in the door panel, astonished by the happiness he saw radiating from the hazy facial features. His chest felt warm; his limbs loose, as if every muscle, usually so tight, had been pummelled by a Nubian masseuse. 

His smile widened until he quite feared for his jawbone. No, he'd been worked over by something infinitely more satisfying. He clenched his buttocks, sighing with reminiscent pleasure as the overstressed muscles around his entrance burned their protest. Sitting down might be embarrassing in company, but it would be worth it.

Quickly rinsing himself down he snatched a towel and wrapped it loosely around his hips, pausing only to run both hands through his damp hair, ruffling it into a jumble of _just-got-laid_ spikes and waves. With a cheeky grin at the glowing reflection in the bathroom mirror he sauntered back into the larger sleeping space, breath trapping in his throat at the sight before him. "Not getting up this morning, Commander?" he husked.

Trip turned onto his hip, champagne flute raised in salute. "For some reason, ah wanna play truant today, Lootenant," he drawled, snagging a cream-smothered strawberry from the dish at the bedside and offering it Malcolm's way. Ignoring the towel's slip at his hip the Brit stooped and snapped it from its stem, a dribble of juice spurting onto his lower lip.

Quick as thought Trip reared off the bed to lick the sweet residue away, a light tug sufficient to bring the other man down in his wake, their nude lengths rubbing comfortably as their legs got tangled. What had happened to his towel Malcolm wasn't sure. When Trip's semi-tumescent cock nudged his thigh, he decided he didn't care.

"Champagne?" the Southerner whispered. Flicking out his tongue, Malcolm nodded.

When Trip took a gulp himself instead of offering the glass his eyebrows made a bolt for the hairline, but as the taller man leaned in and understanding slammed like a runaway shuttlepod he simply opened his lips and closed his eyes, waiting for the sweet sting of bubbly liquor to cascade into his mouth. Its slide down his throat he missed altogether, being overwhelmed by the pleasure of Trip's tongue striking sparks wherever it touched.

Trip felt his relaxation as he groped for another strawberry, not caring which sweet sauce he trailed it through while exultation seemed to roar up right out of his balls. "Likin' breakfast, Mal?" he mouthed wetly against the Brit's exposed throat, waving the chocolaty berry against Reed's dark pink lips. With a sweep of the tongue Malcolm snatched the sugary treat away.

"Chef's sacked," he replied, wriggling contentedly into the cradle of Trip's thighs as he reached behind, smothering a small fruit in chocolate and cream. With a coy dip of the lashes he carried it toward Trip's face, accidentally-on-purpose dripping velvet-smooth cream onto the blond's muscular shoulder. "Oops!

With every rough flick of skilled tongue against his skin Trip felt tingles running down into his groin. Another cool dollop of cream spattered against his collarbone. "Sor-ee!"

"'s okay." Chocolate sauce dripped into his belly button, chased by the tip of that wicked tongue. Trip squirmed, a started yelp escaping as something cool and velvety enveloped his aching erection. Cream, he realised groggily before Malcolm set about cleaning up and coherent thought deserted him altogether.

*

"So is this it? Are we a couple now?"

"I hope so." The hesitant question made his stomach lurch, but when Trip opened his eyes he saw something that restored his wavering confidence and made his heart flip over. Flat on his back, one hand tucked behind his head, the other tickling random patterns over the Southerner's honey-gold flank as he nibbled his well-kissed lips, Malcolm looked supremely content - and mildly quizzical. "I mean, I _want_ us t' be, but it's kind of up to you."

The affirmation didn't seem to fully reassure his companion. "A _proper_ couple, I mean - being seen together and not just sneaking around for sex when the ship's hanging abandoned in spacedock."

"Course." Aware mere words might not be enough Trip plumped for action, trapping the smaller man beneath him and, framing the fine-drawn face in his hands, dove in for a lingering kiss that left Reed bleary-eyed and beautifully flushed. "The other thing's just being fuck-buddies, and I don't do that with someone I love. I did tell y' I love you, right?"

"I believe you may have mentioned it. Oh, and it's mutual, by the way."

He, Malcolm Reed, could bring that glow of bewildered happiness to Trip Tucker's lovely, guileless face. It was, Malcolm considered, unquestionably the proudest achievement of his life.

"Then yeah, I'd say we're a couple," the blond pledged huskily as he turned onto his back, bringing the brunet's more compact length to nestle atop him. "As long as you're okay with people knowing - seein' you with a guy and all."

"Despite my father's vociferous complaints I've never been bothered by my sexuality, and if they can meet the eyes of a two-headed, scorpion-tailed alien speaking in tongues, our subordinates shouldn't be stumped taking orders from an officer in a homosexual relationship. And _do_ close your mouth before a passing shuttle mistakes it for an open launchbay."

"Sorry." Weakly Trip pushed a hand against his lower jaw, holding it in place until the roundabout in his skull stopped spinning. "You're full of surprises, you know that? I never expected a stiff British military type to be so...."

"Gay?"

"I was _going_ to say, so cool about not bein' completely straight."

"Trip, I'm past thirty. I think I've had time to come to terms with what I am." Amusement froze in his chest, tightening his whole body. "As long as _you're_ quite comfortable - being seen with a man, I mean."

"Guess some people'll be surprised, but they're the ones who don't know me." Recognising the worry that darkened his boyfriend's brow Trip wrapped his arms around the man, causing both to gasp at the sudden increase in friction. "Like I said, Johnny knows I'm bi - he even knows how I feel about you, 'cause he called me on it way back, after Lizzie died and I kept blowin' up at you: he kept askin' me how I could be so vicious to someone I loved so much."

"Probably not the best thing to say at the time," Malcolm commented placidly, suddenly fonder of Captain Tact-and-Diplomacy than ever before. Trip's snub nose wrinkled.

"Figure he was trying t' remind me there was more than just anger and grief inside of me." By way of apology for his cruelty he plucked another strawberry from their abandoned plate, brushing its succulent tip across his lover's parted lips. Holding the fruit between his teeth, Malcolm shuffled up to place the berry into Tripâ's mouth.

Juice spurted between them. Lost in a fruity kiss, neither man noticed.

"We tell the crew, then?" Reed asked breathlessly, inching onto his side with one arm draped casually across Tucker's torso. 

"You bet! And I've got to call home. Mom's gonna be so excited!"

Thin lips disappeared, sucked between perfect teeth. "You're going to tell your parents you're sharing your bed with a junior officer - a male junior officer?"

"No, I'm gonna tell them the guy I love returns my feelings." He blinked, pulling himself onto one elbow to stare seriously at his pokerfaced companion. "Aw, shit! You're worrying that pretty head 'f yours about fraternisation, aren't you?"

"One of us has to think of these things." 

He'd witnessed the Reed talent for stationary retreat many times, and the closer the quarters, Trip discovered, the more unnerving it became. "The old rules don't apply to NX missions. You miss that message?" he asked levelly. Despite his horizontal position, Malcolm managed an impressive shrug.

"So Command says - until two of its senior officers aboard its most famous ship get caught with their trousers down. And the Captain..."

"Will be happy for us. You've got to know that."

The tip of an eyebrow twitched. "I suppose I'll take your word for it. No snogging on duty, agreed?"

He managed an unconvincing groan. "Ah just knew you were gonna git prissy!"

"And I simply know you'd be exhibitionist enough to try it." In retaliation Malcolm clipped his naturally precise accent even more than usual, softening the rebuke with a ruffle of Trip's already mussed hair. "Shouldn't we get up now?"

"Why?"

The Englishman clicked his tongue. "Because, Commander, there's a crew of strangers wandering about the ship and they're likely to notice if we don't make an appearance."

"Malcolm, we're on vacation." So he'd caught the knowing looks their way. "We wanna stay here, buck naked and feedin' each other strawberries all day, we can. You want me t' comm. Cap'n Johnny and confirm that?"

"I've no doubt your good friend the Captain would play along with whatever you said, but there's quite enough speculation buzzing around Jupiter Station about our relationship, Mistah Tuckah. You've gone sheet white - are you all right?"

 _Fine, for a man in the middle of a cardiac arrest._ "Guess you've heard them whisperin' about us?"

Malcolm treated him to a toothy smile. "They've obviously studied the same dictionary as you: a Yank one that omits the words _tact_ and _discretion_ altogether," he answered coolly. "I'd rather tell our colleagues - our _friends,_ \- about us myself than have them hear those lurid rumours, if it's all the same to you."

Telling the others. Being seen together as more than just buddies. The enormity of what the most private of men was offering staggered him. It was all Trip could do to nod.

"You sure we can't stay like this for the rest of the vacation?" he murmured at length, realising by the miniscule pout forming on the lips hovering over his own that some form of verbal response was required. Malcolm dipped in, letting his tongue feather the gap left by Trip's grin.

"I wish! Lunch, 1230 hours?"

Glancing at the chronometer opposite the bed, Trip nodded. "Three hours? That'll give me enough time to comm. home and give my folks the good news - long as Becky's not visitin' because she was born with the _pause_ key missing!"

Malcolm froze with one leg hanging off the bed. "You're going to tell your family _today?_ " he asked faintly. Trip yanked him inelegantly back to sprawl across him. 

"Yep. I can't leave Momma in suspense. Listen, Mal, when I called to say I wouldn't be goin' home this leave, I told them everything: about how I'd slept with someone I cared for but didn't love, and been a shit to a person I _do_ love who was never gonna love me back. And even before I could mention your name Mom said, _oh Trip, I'm so sorry baby! He's straight isn't he?_ Seems she knew how I felt all along.

"Hell, it's just as well she guessed, because I spent an hour spillin' my guts over you and what a jerk I'd been. First time I've used that privileged position of mine with Johnny, because we were only s'posed to have fifteen minutes subspace each."

"He probably gave you twelve minutes from my allocation." Feeling the heat seeping into him from the hard, muscular body underneath made ignoring the sniggers of the station staff suddenly more tempting, but taking advantage of Trip's stupefaction Malcolm heaved himself upright and reached for the balled-up bundle that was his jeans, boxers and socks in the middle of the floor. "It doesn't take long to say, hello, still in one piece, maybe see you in a few weeks, after all."

"Your parents?" Tucker hazarded.

"Maddie. She passes on the news that I'm still kicking: saves us all the awkwardness of direct contact. I - I'm not quite equal to facing the Old Fart about us, Trip, but if you don't mind I think I _would_ like Madeleine to know."

Stark naked in the middle of his lover's bedroom he still managed to remind Trip of a guilty schoolboy outside the principal's office, even down to the hands clasped modestly (and uselessly) at his crotch. "Darlin', why would I mind? You think she'll be happy?"

It broke his heart to see the confusion flash over Reed's angular features. "I suppose so," he said doubtfully. "She was there when I outed myself to the parents, and we've always got on well enough. Anyway, whether she's pleased or not, I want her to know. Pop will assume I've taken up with you to spite him and Mum'll just wring her hands, but Mad... I think she'll like you."

"I _know_ Mom an' Dad'll love you." It was a lot to ask, but the idea in Trip's head somehow found its way straight onto his tongue. "Say, maybe we could go visit for a few days? Dad'll bore y' with his fishing stories and Mom won't be happy 'til you've put on twenty pounds, but they'll be so excited to meet you, and Susie's boy Jack talks about nothin' but guns and explosions, and... am I going too fast here?"

"You're being you." Halfway through dressing, Malcolm leaned in to stop the flow of exuberant speech with a kiss. "And please - don't ever change that. Your parents wouldn't feel I was intruding?"

"They'll hug the stuffin' out 'f you at the space port, then bore y' silly with all the embarrassing baby pictures," Trip promised, pulling himself up against the pillow for a better view of his boyfriend's deft, efficient dressing ritual. "Then Becky and Susie and my little brother Robbie'll all come with their families and you'll wind up covered in chocolate and ice cream because the kids'll all want to hug y' too. Think you can handle that?"

He meant it as a joke, but watching Malcolm's knuckles tighten around his shirt collar he guessed it might have misfired and, independent of his brain, his mouth began a rapid backtrack. "We wouldn't have to stay more'n a couple of days; and maybe we could go say hi to Maddie?" he rattled, scrabbling in the wrong drawer for clean underwear for the sake of something to do. "I've never been to London, and we could always get ourselves a hotel if it'd be too much trouble to stay with her..."

"I'm sure she'd insist we stay at her place." Wandering hand-in-hand around the Tower; stealing kisses in Hyde Park; showing off the splendours of Buckingham Palace and the British Museum. For the first time in ages, Malcolm Reed actually wanted to go home. "I'll comm. her before lunch and arrange it - let me know when's convenient for your family."

"I already know: whenever suits us." He couldn't stop himself stealing another kiss, his mind reeling from the knowledge it was appreciated. "You'll prob'ly find my folks a little overwhelming, because Tuckers hug and holler a lot..."

"Don't expect much _huggin' and hollerin'_ from Madeleine," Malcolm advised drily as he finger-combed some kind of order to his hair. "If you get a small smile when she shakes you hand, it means you'vee passed inspection."

"I'll polish mah boots that day," Trip volunteered brightly. Unexpected laughter fizzed the back of Malcolm's throat.

"Idiot," he said, fondly chucking his lover under the chin. "You're sure it won't be an imposition to your parents, my turning up on the doorstep?"

"Sure." More than mere politeness, the question was cutting proof of a concealed insecurity that wrung his vulnerable heart. Trip seized his lover's hands, smothering the knuckles with ardent kisses until, hooting with laughter, Malcolm wrenched them away. "And what do you say to extendin' our vacation for some quality R&R, just the two of us? Someplace with a bed, a bath, a kitchen and a door we can lock the galaxy behind?"

"I say: yes, please." Sent giddy by the mere thought, Malcolm let himself sag into the support of the blond's extended arms, nuzzling his nose into the hollow of Trip's throat. "But where..."

"You just leave that to me." Complete privacy, stunning views out over the bay, and a sympathetic landlord who would know when his presence wasn't welcome. Yes, Trip knew just the place to pamper his lovely, reclusive new man.


	11. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's an incurable romantic holidaying on Earth from whom Trip needs a favour.

Captain Jonathan Archer tugged the brim of his baseball cap down further over his eyes, arching himself off his pristine private band of Caribbean beach like a great sandy cat. Blindly he reached for the palm padd he never left his rustic hut without, muting its incessant beep before adjusting his sunglasses and pushing himself up from the hips, shielding the screen from the sun's glare with a glistening shoulder.

_From: Cmdr C. Tucker  
To: Capt. J. Archer_

_Hey Johnny,_

_Hope you're having a good time and your hermit's cell is as peaceful as you remember. Are you still letting out your penthouse to deserving Starfleet officers, because I know a couple who could use a discreet place with a bath, a bed and a half-stocked kitchen for a couple of days._

_Malcolm and I are visiting his sister next week, then spending a few days with my folks. Mom's going crazy with excitement, and you know she has this habit of smothering her guests, so he's going to need at least a week of intensive R &R by the time we escape. _

_I'm giving you two guesses how Mal reacted to the promise of having the stuffing hugged out of him at the spaceport! The poor guy's gone into panic mode already, and believe me - that don't make him a comfortable room mate._

_Okay, was that enough of a clue? I've finally gotten up the courage to confess and hot damn! He was there just waiting all the time, sure I was the straightest man in the galaxy and I'd never give him a glance. He's loved me all along, and now - well, let's say we're making up for lost time. I promise we'll use the guest room: hell, I'll even launder the sheets by hand!_

_Jon, you know what he's like, fretting about rules and protocols and fraternisation. Guess it's the ultimate compliment he's willing to put all that crap aside to be with me (and he promises he's not going to scuttle into his shell when the crew come back; he's actually willing to be seen with me, no disguises. Think he's got it as bad as me?) but you've got to promise you'll back me all the same. Command ain't going to give a flying fuck what we're doing, and as long as it's not done on duty neither are you - right?_

_It was a sneaky thing to do, not telling me he was the other crewman staying on board but I guess I'll forgive you since it got us the time we needed to straighten ourselves out. Let's just say we've not got much work done in the last few days, because like Mal says, it's not good practice to work naked around munitions, and putting on clothes is just a waste of time when we keep tearing them off each other again._

_You probably didn't need to know that, did you?_

"No buddy, I didn't." His bronzed face split by a mammoth grin, Jonathan Archer barely restrained the urge to punch the air with glee. He'd just known all those two stubborn numbskulls needed was a little one-to-one time.

_Anyhow, I figure we could both use a few days' vacation to ourselves after we've done the meeting-the-folks - or some of them anyway, you have any idea how long it's been since Malcolm was in the same room as his dad? That is one dysfunctional family, I tell you._

_This time you know the place'll be left spotless, because Mal takes neat-freakery to a whole new level. He's even had me tidy my desk, and if that ain't love, I don't know what is._

_Have a great vacation, Jon. It can't be better than mine!_

_Trip._

His chuckle merged with the scream of a seabird overhead as Jonathan tapped a single sentence in reply. He didn't care what their mission held in store for them now. With Trip and Malcolm having finally found their way back to each other, he knew he had just the united, happy team he needed behind him to face it.


End file.
